


Study Buddies

by FrozenSnares



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Adding other characters/tags as I go, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Anger, Annoyance, Attempted Sexual Assault, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Implied Sexual Content, Kinda, Kissing, M/M, Present Tense, Skagos, Smut, Swearing, a really slow burn, friends - Freeform, growing friendship, mostly because I'm going to forget something, pov switching
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-14
Updated: 2015-09-29
Packaged: 2018-04-09 08:49:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 19
Words: 56,749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4341971
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FrozenSnares/pseuds/FrozenSnares
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Shireen Baratheon has been at Skagos Correctional Institution for the past five years. She’s on her way out as a graduating senior, hoping for a scholarship that will take her far away from her parents. Unfortunately, she is forced to become study partners with Rickon Stark, who really doesn’t seem to care about academics in the slightest. In order for her to graduate, he has to pass all of his classes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Picset](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com/post/124089227311/study-buddies-chapter-1-shireen-baratheon-has)

Skagos Correctional Institution is definitely one of the worse places Shireen has ever been to. For the past five years, she had be hauled off to this terrible excuse for a school, and, while she really hated spending time with her family, she was seriously thinking about going back the next time one of these mandatory school dances came up. Her only saving grace was that this dance was a masquerade, so no one could actually see her face. With any luck, she would spend the next hour sitting in this corner and escape before anyone noticed her.

Unfortunately, things almost never went as planned for her. She had a massive bad luck streak ever since she got permanent scars from a childhood bout of chickenpox. One attempt at a home herbal remedy and her mother never wanted to look at her again. Not to mention the relentless teasing and ridicule she faced at school.

Her bad luck tonight came in the form of a boy who had been staring at her for the past hour or so. He was sitting across the room, and kept looking over at her. It started as small, subtle glances, but he is outright staring at her now. 

Shireen wishes she were invisible. This Back-to-School dance is one of her least favorite events of the year. Without meaning to, Shireen dreams of life next year, after her graduation, when she could move out and finally be free from this form of torture. Pulling out her phone, Shireen checks the time. Only forty more minutes to endure. With a sigh (and a little bit of hope) she checks the Wi-Fi. It’s still out. After the first dud event that the Skagos employees threw, they started cutting the Wi-Fi to get kids to participate.

After another few minutes, she glances back at that boy. He is still staring at her. Crossing her arms and legs, Shireen decides that she’s going to stare back. Maybe she could make him uncomfortable enough to look away. She watches him wave off a few people and decline some drinks. Then, he finally stands up.

For a fleeting moment, Shireen thinks he’d leave. He starts walking toward her. Swearing internally, Shireen tries to busy herself looking elsewhere, but she keeps glancing back to that boy. He takes a seat next to her, even though every other chair is also empty. Shireen tries to ignore him.

She can actually feel him staring at her. Never in her life had she been stared at so intensely before. And people weren’t exactly shy about mentioning how fucked up her face was. After another minute of feeling his stare, she turns sharply to him. Immediately, she recognizes him. He had only been here for a year, but it wasn’t hard to miss Rickon Stark’s messy auburn curls. Still, she doesn’t waver.

“Is there anything I can help you with?” she asks sharply.

Rickon tries not to flinch away from her sharp tongue. Hadn’t they just been staring at each other for half the night? Didn’t people who stared at each other want to do things together? There’s definitely some unusual behavior going on here from one of them, but Rickon has been captivated by her incredibly bright blue eyes. He isn’t going to back down from this. He tries at a casual shrug. “Well, you've been looking at me with sex eyes all night, so I thought you might want to dance.”

Shireen snorts. “I have not been making sex eyes at you, Stark. There just isn’t much to look at, and I was wondering why you weren't dancing either.”

“So you know who I am?” Rickon asks, trying to keep a conversation going. “I must say this masked dance isn’t as incognito as you’d think it would be.”

Shireen rolls her eyes, looking around to the rest of the dance floor. A large percentage of the students have already removed their masks, obviously here for something other than the anonymity of the dance. She sits next to Rickon in absolute silence for the next few minutes. Surprisingly, he doesn’t try to put an arm around her or hit on her in any way. Shireen assumes that he wouldn’t have bothered coming over if he could actually see her face, but she just tries to out-last the dance. Checking her phone, she finds that there are only five minutes left.

“So do you want to dance?” Rickon asks abruptly.

“There’s only five minutes left,” Shireen says bluntly. She doesn’t dance. Even if she tried, she knows she wouldn’t dance well. 

Rickon shrugs. “Then, let’s have the last dance together,” he says. “You’re not seriously going to go the whole time without actually dancing?”

“I have for the past five years,” Shireen points out.

“Maybe it’s time to make new traditions.”

Shireen suppresses a groan. He certainly is stubborn. There wouldn’t be much harm in it anyway. “Fine,” she says. “But I am not taking off this mask.”

“Okay,” he agrees. “I won’t either.”

“I already know who you are.”

“But now you won't be able to see exactly how good I look in this tux,” Rickon retorts, gesturing to his outfit that was very clearly not a tux. He’s wearing a pair of jeans and a button-down t-shirt. Neither of which were ripped, but they are nowhere close to making up a tux.

“That's not a tux,” Shireen says slowly.

“It’s still the nicest thing I own,” Rickon says. He stands up and stretches out. After a bit, he holds out his hand to her. “The song’s going to change soon.”

Begrudgingly, Shireen takes his hand, praying that the last song isn’t something slow. They walk onto the dance floor together. When the song changes, she breathes out a sigh of relief. Pop songs are good. She can just bounce around to those and not have to touch anyone. Fortunately, Rickon doesn’t try to move any closer to her. They maintain a reasonable distance, dancing about to the music. And it’s fun, watching everyone stomp about to a definite rhythm. The small breaks and pauses are also enjoyable for once in her life. Occasionally, Rickon shouts out some of the lyrics, and the song ends without incident.

Shireen makes for the exit immediately, hoping to avoid the cluster of people trying to escape into each other’s rooms. Most students seem to be lagging around near the entrance to the cafeteria, and she blessedly makes her way back to her dorm with no one around. She’s nearing the building of her dorm when she realizes that Rickon is still on her heels.

“Are you following me?” she asks.

“Believe it or not, I actually live over here, too,” he says, giving her a smile.

“So you’re one of the lucky underclassmen that has parents willing to pay for a single?” Shireen asks, moderately jealous that he had a room to his self.

“Yep,” Rickon says. He stuffs his hands in his pockets and kicks at the ground. “My loving parents were willing to send me away, but they wanted the best comfort for me.”

“I didn’t mean—”

“I get it.”

Shireen swallows, trying to think of a way to smooth out the conversation. “So why did you want to dance?” she asks, wincing at how bad it sounded.

“I already told you,” Rickon says, looking over at her. “You were making sex eyes at me.”

“My eyes don’t do that, actually,” she says. “They like to stick to their own business.”

“Well, they pulled me in,” Rickon replies, opening the front door of the building for her. He gives her a wide smile, despite the lights illuminating more of her face. Shireen hopes that her scars are still hidden. “Getting caught in your gaze was fun. We should do it again sometime.”

“Not likely,” Shireen says, trying to end the conversation. She searches about for the corridor leading to her room, heading in the direction. She turns to Rickon quickly to cut off the conversation for the night. He’s leaning against a wall, staring at her intently. He doesn’t seem put-off at all by her shielded demeanor.

“I’m going off this way,” he says, pointing with his thumb over his shoulder. “I’ll see you around, though.”

Rickon watches Shireen’s mouth open with an inaudible response before she hurries off down the hall. With a smirk to his self, Rickon heads down the hall and back to his room. Unlocking the door, Rickon thinks on his small status as one of the students with their own room. It isn’t much of a comfort to him after the shit he went through to get here, but he supposes it was better to isolate his self from the actual delinquents of the school than to try making peace with them. Tossing off his mask—an arts and crafts project consisting of about 5 minutes of effort—he falls down onto his bed before deciding to shower.

That is definitely the best part about this living arrangement. A private shower in his room is probably the only thing people cared about when they thought of singles. The rest of the student body has communal showers dispersed throughout the individual halls. Stripping down, Rickon jumps in the shower, lost in thought about the girl with the bright blue eyes. He tries to remember what she actually looked like, but he keeps thinking about her incredibly blue eyes. She probably has dark hair. And he’s about eighty percent sure that she’s shorter than him, but that isn’t much to go on. Most people were shorter than him.

Even with the water beating down on him, Rickon can’t get her off his mind. It’s so stupid. He doesn’t know anything about her. And their one dance had been to a pop song. It had been fun, sure, but he feels like something was supposed to happen. He probably watches too many movies. That isn’t how people work.

\--

The next day, Rickon dreads his upcoming “special assignment” class. It’s a different class every semester and absolutely required for every student to take. Last year, he had been forced to clean the school in the name of community service which felt a lot more like slave labor to him. He’d honestly rather have his group therapy class, and that was almost literally torture. 

Groaning, Rickon slumps into a chair in the classroom. The seats are arranged in a circle, and he really doesn’t want to look at his classmates today. He isn’t in the mood for it. People file in and regular chatter starts picking up. Rickon quickly glances around. He notices that this looked like two mixed classes. There are a few students here who are definitely older than him. Frowning, Rickon really hopes this wasn’t one of those pen pal classes where you make a friend for life or some shit like that.

Things start looking worse and worse. Rickon glances around when a familiar color catches his eye. He searches out the color again to no avail. Everyone is consumed in their own chatter. He hates the feeling, though—like he’d missed something important while reading and he needs to go back and re-read the entire page. Giving up on his search, he gives the teacher the smallest amount of attention possible while he announces this semester’s special assignment: study partners.

Rickon lets out a groan. Usually, that means that the class becomes a study hall period. But here, it means that they have to report back every week in front of the entire class with what they’re doing. Ignoring the rest of the instructions, Rickon begins looking around for a partner. He needs to find someone willing to talk their way through the assignment without actually having to meet up and do any work. Soon, they’re released to find partners.

Almost immediately, the class pairs off. There were previously-established friend groups that flock together, and the reluctant kids usually get forced together. As he expected, there are a few kids still sitting, looking around at each other to see who they get stuck with. He looks at his potential partners closely: there’s a skinny kid with dark hair who looks like he wants a chasm to swallow him whole, another kid who’s too busy messing with his phone to be paying any sort of attention, and a girl who looks like she would rather be partners with a wall. She isn’t even looking at the group. But more surprisingly, no one is looking at her.

The female population here is close to zero, and that usually means that girls got picked up fast as dates or project partners. Rickon also prefers having girls as group partners, if not for flirting with them, then because they usually do all the work. 

He watches her for a minute more. Not once does she look his way. It feels a little bit like she’s intentionally avoiding him. Just as the teacher calls a minute left to settle on partners, he gets up to take the seat next to her.

“Hey, do you need a partner?” he asks lamely. Forced introductions are the worst. It just makes everything seem really fake.

“No, thanks,” she says. “I think the class is odd, so I might get to work alone.”

“I’m surprised someone didn’t pick you up yet,” Rickon says, leaning back in his chair.

She scoffs. A hand starts twisting at a strand of her dark hair, but she still doesn’t look his way. “Yeah, well, perks of being ugly.”

“Hey, you’re not—”

She turns swiftly toward him. Rickon suppresses a small flinch. There’s a massive knot of scars covering half of her face. It’s a little jarring, but not terribly horrible once you look past it. Besides, she has a fairly pretty face. She looks a little underfed, but her eyes are—

“Don’t I know you?” Rickon blurts out.

Her face flushes, and she turns away. “Probably not. I don’t get out much.”

“Yeah, me neither,”” Rickon says quickly. “It’s just that your eyes—”

The teacher calls the class back to attention. He can see the girl sigh, and he has no doubt that this is the same girl from last night. She’s the right size, she has black hair, and her eyes are the brightest blue he has ever seen. There is no way that anyone else had eyes as bright as hers. Even when she has that challenging look in them, her eyes still look ridiculously bright. Rickon continues glancing over to her until their teacher finally turns to them.

“That leaves you two,” he says. “I hope you were actually planning on partnering.”

Shireen opens her mouth to protest, but the teacher just marks something on his clipboard and walks off. Then, he starts explaining the syllabus. Rickon watches her slump down in her chair. She looks defeated but like she is furious about it. He most certainly does not want to cross her. He glances up as the teacher begins handing out their assignments. Rickon doesn’t listen to any of it. He just takes the papers when offered to him. It doesn’t take long for them to be released to learn more about their partners.

He is fully prepared to start an amiable conversation with her when she rounds on him. “Do you work?” she asks sharply.

Rickon recoils slightly. He doesn’t think it’s common for high school students to have jobs. “Um… no?”

“You don’t do work?” she asks again, arching an eyebrow up.

“Oh, yeah, I can do schoolwork,” he says slowly.

“Then, you will.” She begins scribbling over the syllabus, underlining words and dates, making marks everywhere. “My only way to get out of this prison and away from everything is on an academic scholarship, and you are _not_ ruining that for me, got it?”

“Um, yes, ma’am,” Rickon replies. There’s a new kind of fire in her eyes, but he still can’t really look away from the piercing blue.

After a while, she puts her syllabus in his lap, asking him to write out his information for her. He does so, wondering when she’ll do the same for him. She doesn’t. She just taps her foot vigorously, looking around. Rickon writes out everything as legibly as he can. Handing the papers back, he asks, “Are you sure I don’t know you?”

She completely ignores his question. “We’ll meet Mondays and Thursdays in the library at four,” she says firmly. “Log in times can be our proof of meeting, and then we can go our separate ways.”

“Are you always like this?” Rickon asks. He just wants to know why she’s acting so strangely.

She doesn’t respond to that either. She just rolls her eyes and puts her things away, looking to a clock to see when the class ends.

“Can you at least tell me your name?” Rickon asks, no longer expecting her to acknowledge her existence.

It takes a while. But so close to the bell ringing that it had to be calculated, she says, “My name is Shireen.”

An instant later, the bell sounds and she’s out the door.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Picset](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com/post/124714421041/study-buddies-chapter-2)

Shireen is pissed.

This stupid study program that she had been forced into hadn’t been that bad so far. At the very least, her partner was willing to show up, even though he rarely seemed to be studying. While she poured over books and focused on what she needed to learn, Rickon was more likely to be caught napping or doodling on scrap pieces of paper. Shireen didn’t think anything of it until he flunked one of his tests. As luck would have it, their teacher blamed her for it. She tried to talk her way out of it, but the damage was done. Now, she was responsible for getting his grades up.

Fortunately, Rickon is in the library at the time he was supposed to be, but he appears to be napping again. Shireen drops her books on the table and he wakes with a jolt. She tosses the math test at him. “Do you want to tell me what that is?” she asks in a sharp whisper.

Rickon groans and looks down on the test. “That’s my math test.”

“You failed.”

Rickon shrugs. “Can’t win them all,” he says.

“You literally wrote forty-two for all the answers,” Shireen says back. She takes the seat across from him and crosses her arms.

“It’s _my_ test,” Rickon replies. “Why do you care?”

“Because our stupid asshole of a teacher has decided to fail me if you don’t get your grades up,” Shireen shoots at him.

“That’s bullshit,” Rickon says. “Just because I’m bad at math.”

Shireen gapes at him. “You _literally_ wrote forty-two for _all_ of the answers.”

Rickon rolls his eyes. “Fine, I’ll do the stupid make-up test,” he says. “And you can stop jumping on me about this.” He starts working on re-writing all the test questions and working out their actual answers.

The sound of his pencil scratching against paper is the only noise, and Shireen just watches him. She makes sure that he’s actually putting effort into getting the answers right. Then, she finally opens up her book for English, muttering, “All this because of some stupid sex eyes…”

Immediately, Rickon looks up to her. His lips are slightly parted and his eyes are open wide.

She glares back at him, biting down her swear. “Get back to work.”

“You remember,” he breathes out.

Shireen tries to ignore the way his eyes are catching the light. The last thing she wants to deal with is some underclassman trying to hit on her. She turns so that she isn’t facing him directly. Shoving her nose in the book, she starts reading.

“You’re seriously going to ignore me?” Rickon asks. He can’t believe the gall of this girl. She just goes about her life as if no one else exists, and she really doesn’t seem to care about him in the slightest.

Shireen just keeps on reading. He watches her leg start bouncing, and her fingers start tapping the cover of the book. Regardless of how he got thrown into this situation with her, he would really rather have someone who would at least talk to him. Shireen attends all of their study sessions in complete silence, and Rickon is positive that she would rather be anywhere else but here. She even flees from the library right after they finish, not bothering to say goodbye. He still doesn’t even have her phone number.

Slowly and very intentionally, he writes down forty-two as the answer to the next problem. Shireen slams the book shut and glares at him. Rickon smiles at her and writes forty-two as the answer to the next one, too.

“Do your work,” she hisses out.

“I am,” Rickon says. He writes down another few forty-twos before she snaps at him.

“Are you trying to make me fail?” she asks, slapping a hand down on the paper.

“Are you going to keep ignoring me?” he shoots back.

She falters, picking up her book again. Fumbling with the pages, she slowly finds her place and begins reading again. Rickon writes another forty-two. She nearly throws the book at him. “Alright, listen here,” she whispers loudly. “I am not going to fail this stupid class because you won’t do your work. So you best do it right or I’ll find a way to get rid of you.”

“Just admit that you remember me.”

Shireen is silent for a few minutes, waiting to see if he’d get to work without her prompting him. Rickon leans back in his chair, his arms resting behind his head. He’s smirking at her, and she wants to smack that smile off his face.

“Fine,” she says. “You stared at me for a full hour at the back-to-school dance. Happy?”

Rickon shrugs. “Sure, if you’re going to be such a bitch about it.”

She actually does slap him then, standing up and tossing his papers to the floor. Then, she grabs her books and storms out of the library. Rickon rubs at his jaw. He didn’t think that Shireen would be particularly strong, but she could definitely hurt someone when she’s angry. Slowly, he picks up the fallen papers, taking the time to stack them nicely and put them back in their proper folders. Then, he lets out a heavy sigh. Maybe she isn’t worth the crush.

What’s her problem anyway? Doesn’t she realize that treating people like actual people is a better way to get what she wanted?

Rickon tries to assume that she was having a harder life than he is. It doesn’t really seem possible, but he forces himself to erase the incorrect answers and actually solve the problems. It takes a fair amount of time, and he’s still in the library when the sun goes down, but he manages it.

The next day, Rickon ignores Shireen completely. The part of his jaw where she struck him had bruised slightly, but he pretends that it isn’t there. He spends a particularly awkward class session with the two of them looking completely away from the other the entire time. It isn’t until Shireen races out of the room that she finally looks back at him. He does his best to glare at her, and she goes on her way.

Outside, Shireen clutches her books tighter to her chest. She certainly hadn’t meant to actually hurt him. While she feels perfectly justified in her actions, she doesn’t want him to actually think poorly of her. Strengthening her resolve, she goes back outside to sit on the grass. On the way out, she crashes into Edric Storm. Immediately, her heart skips a beat.

Shireen secretly had had a crush on Edric for the past couple of years. He has black hair and blue eyes just like hers, and she thinks that the way he smirked at everyone was particularly attractive. 

Edric is smiling at her today, easing her away from him. “I didn’t see you there, Shireen,” he says. He glances up at the building she came out of. “Did you get roped into the stupid study class this semester?”

Shireen nods. “And paired up with some kid who doesn’t want to do his work,” she says. “Just my luck.”

Edric laughs. “Well, I’m sure you can bully him into submission,” he says. “But, hey, I’ve gotta run. I’ll talk to you later.”

With that, Edric runs off, meeting up with a rather large group of boys who all seem to be laughing about something. Shireen brushes her hair behind her ear and tries to float along on the feeling he leaves in her stomach. He is always so nice to her, especially compared to how people usually look at her. He certainly is something.

\--

For the next couple of weeks, Shireen doesn’t see Rickon at their study sessions. He is conveniently absent from all of them, though he somehow manages to be marked present. She never gets flack for any of it, so she tries to ignore it. However, she’s starting to feel extremely guilty about how she acted toward him. Rickon may just be some underclassman that she needs to put up with, but there is no reason for her to snap at him so much.

One day, he’s even absent from their class. Shireen looks out for him the entire time. She wants to apologize to him and try to reach some sort of comfort around him, but he never shows up.

Shireen tries not to take it as a personal slight, but she finds herself feeling more and more distressed about it. When he doesn’t show up during the next class session, she seeks him out. After digging through her backpack for the class syllabus, she finds her way to his room and knocks.

There is no response.

She tries knocking again. This time, there’s a small _thud_ from the other side of the door. She knocks harder. “Rickon?” she calls.

There is quite a bit of shuffling from the other side of the door, before it cracks open a tiny bit. “Did I fail another test?” he asks.

His voice was sounds extremely odd, and his eyes are completely bloodshot. Great. He’s probably high. Shireen tries to open her mouth, but she can’t decide if she wants to apologize or tell him off. Rickon stares at her with uncaring eyes before he finally shuts the door. Shireen knocks again and he lets out a loud groan.

“Just fuck off, woman,” he says weakly.

Shireen keeps knocking. “Open this door,” she says sharply.

The door cracks open again, but she can’t see Rickon. Looking down, she finds him sitting next to the doorway, leaning against the wall. He doesn’t seem to be able to hold himself up. Shireen steps into the room with her hands on her hips, ready to tell him off when he starts coughing. Each cough wracks through his body, leaving him shaking and doubled over. She can hear them coming from deep in his lungs. Rickon sniffles, wiping blindly at his nose with a sleeve. He looks up at her, holding up his head with a hand. “Can I help you?” he asks before falling into another bout of coughing.

“You’re sick,” Shireen says. She looks around his room, finally noticing all the tissues that are scattered around his bed. The comforter has fallen to the floor, and he seems to be missing a pillow.

“No shit,” Rickon replies, trying to get to his feet. He barely manages to shift his body weight before he slumps back down. Looking at him now, Shireen realizes that he is completely worn out. He’s probably been sick for days. His hair looks entirely limp, and his skin has lost almost all of its color.

Shireen lets out a heavy sigh, entering the room completely. She needs to clean up at least some of this mess for him. He doesn’t look like he is capable of moving, much less making his room have decent living conditions. Rickon lets out a moan, and she looks back down to him. He looks like he is about to fall asleep on the floor. Crouching down, Shireen presses a hand to his forehead. He’s burning up, and Shireen thinks he be belongs in a hospital. She knows that they’ll call his parents if that happens, though, and he doesn’t seem to be on particularly good terms with them.

“When’s the last time you ate?” Shireen asks, pressing her hand against his cheek.

He leans into her touch, and she feels the entire weight of his head on her hand. It’s like carrying a bowling ball with one hand. Rickon’s eyelids flutter. He never quite makes it to looking at her, but he asks back, “What day is it?”

“Wednesday,” Shireen says gently.

Rickon’s fingers flick with small movements before his hand falls limp. “It’s been a… It’s… it’s Wednesday…”

“Okay, you need food,” she says. Then, she looks back down to him. “And a shower. Come on.”

Carefully, she reaches down for the hem of his shirt and pulls it off of him. Rickon feels like a ragdoll. He just moves limply in whatever direction she pulls him in. She tosses the shirt into the corner of his room, watching it hit a small pile of tissues. Then, she opens the door to his bathroom and starts running the hot water.

“Oh, it’s a good thing you have your own shower,” she says. Throwing one of his arms over her shoulders, Shireen tries to lift him up. She manages to half-drag him over to the shower. Shireen huffs out a loud breath. “Go clean up, and then we’ll see how you manage.”

Without seeming to hear her at all, Rickon starts to finish undressing. Shireen runs from the room, closing the door in the process. Thinking that this can make up for her earlier actions, Shireen rolls up her sleeves and sets to work. She manages to collect all the tissues easily enough, and then she locates a laundry basket and dumps any article of clothing on the floor into it. Shaking out his sheets, she re-makes his bed (locating his missing pillow underneath it) and opens up a window. Then, Shireen seeks out the key to his dorm, testing it several times before actually leaving.

He desperately needs food. Rickon probably hasn’t put anything into his stomach for the past few days. She isn’t even sure what you were supposed to feed sick people. Running a bit, Shireen finds her way to the tiny student store. It’s easy enough to find the medicines, stacked up mostly behind locked glass. She silently curses her peers. If she so much as tried to buy any, they would contact her parents and probably find out about Rickon as well. Instead, she grabs some cans of ginger ale and chicken noodle soup. 

On her way back to his room, Shireen nicks a bowl and a spoon from the school’s only restaurant, telling herself that she’ll return them later. Shireen fumbles outside of Rickon’s door for a bit, holding everything in one hand while she opens it.

Rickon is lying face-down on top of his bed. A towel is still wrapped around his waist, and his wet hair is soaking his pillow. Shireen dumps the food onto his dresser before digging through it for clean clothes. Luckily, there are no surprises in his drawers, and she tosses him a clean set to wear. Rickon seems to be moving on autopilot, automatically trying to dress himself. Shireen stares pointedly at a wall while she prepares him some food in his microwave.

It isn’t until she hears him slump back into bed that she looks back to him. He coughs weakly. “It’s too bright,” he mumbles.

Shireen walks over, setting the hot soup on his bedside table. Then, she closes the curtains and turns off the lights. Rickon sighs, and she goes over to press a soda into his hand. Blinking at her, Rickon seems to only just notice that she’s there. He squints his eyes at her. “Did I fail another test?”

“No, sweetie,” she says, running a hand through his wet hair. “You’re just sick, so I thought you could use my help.”

Rickon nods, still moving minimally. Shireen thinks that he’s close to falling asleep again, so she holds out the soup to him. Very slowly, Rickon sips at the broth, taking an extraordinarily long time to chew the noodles. He only manages to take a few bites and a few sips of his drink before he slumps back down in bed, dozing off.

He really is a cute kid. There are probably plenty of girls here who’d gladly date him. Shireen pulls a blanket over him before rearranging the small supply of food she brought him. She pockets his key, gathers up her things, and leaves the room.

\--

Rickon isn’t entirely sure when Shireen learned how to get into his room, but she seems to be over an awful lot now. He had gotten sick, and then food had magically appeared in his room. That was probably her doing, though. Rickon just can’t remember any of it. He’s watching her wander his room, locating the remote control for his TV. He isn’t even sure if he managed to set it up correctly.

Still, Shireen takes a seat at his desk and turns the TV on. Rickon looks over to her, wondering how she became so familiar in his room. He still feels a little bit guilty about testing her patience so much, but he thinks she got him back with that slap. Rickon tries not to look too closely at her. He knows that nothing good can come out of crushing on her, but he just can’t help himself when he sees her piercing bright eyes and smooth black hair.

“Are you hungry?” Shireen asks, raising her eyebrows at him.

He had been staring at her again. “You know, I think I’m fine now,” he says. It’s true. Most of the coughing was gone now, and he could walk around just fine. “Seriously, I know you don’t want to be here.”

Shireen shrugs. “We have to study somewhere,” she says. “And I wanted to find a way to apologize for hitting you.”

“Well, I think we’re even,” Rickon says. “You don’t have to waste your time anymore.”

Shireen rolls her eyes at him. Rickon tries not to smile at her. She doesn’t seem to notice. “I’m trying to say sorry,” she says. “And I don’t want you to think that I’m always a bitch or something.”

Rickon winces. “I was just mad,” he says, turning away from her. “I mean, you just expect things from people without trying to get to know them. We’ve been in this stupid thing for nearly a month, and I still don’t know your last name.”

“Baratheon.”

“Oh, it’s because your family’s famous,” Rickon says, turning back to her.

Shireen’s jaw falls open. “Easy for you to say, Stark.”

“I don’t hide it, though,” Rickon counters.

Shireen’s hand makes a lazy swipe at his chest over the back of the desk chair. Rickon tries to catch the blow, but he only manages to grab her hand once it goes still. He lets go quickly. He isn’t going to get involved with her. He doesn’t need to have the ghost of her touches following him to sleep every night.

“Well, I’ve got nowhere else to be,” Shireen says. She gets up and sits backwards on the chair to look over at him. As an afterthought, she turns off the TV. “Twenty questions. Let’s go.”

Rickon is terribly tempted to dig into her personal life. She’s basically asking for it, but he restrains himself, asking only tame questions. Several times he manages to make her laugh, and he counts each of those moments as little victories. Finally, he’s getting to know the mysterious girl with the bright blue eyes.

The only problem is that Rickon knows he’s falling more in love with her.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Picset](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com/post/125494885501/study-buddies-chapter-3)

Of all the friends Shireen could have made at Skagos, Rickon Stark is probably the best candidate. He has yet to ask about the scars on her face or why she ended up here in the first place. They started getting along much better after he recovered from his illness, and Shireen really doesn’t have any other friends to hang out with. She finds herself hanging out with Rickon more and more. It isn’t until a three-day weekend that Shireen realizes she has literally nothing else going on in her life.

“What are you still doing here?” Rickon asks that day, putting down the pencil he had been trying to balance on his nose.

Shireen is lounging on his bed, looking through one of his boxes of stuff. “Did you want me to leave?” she asks.

“I meant for this weekend,” Rickon says. “Everyone’s gone, but we’re still just doing nothing.”

“Yup,” Shireen says, rolling onto her back and putting a toy gun down. “I mean, I don’t even want to go home for Christmas. I’m not exactly jumping at the opportunity.”

Rickon gives her a short look before turning to face the window. His phone starts buzzing on the desk. Shireen watches him answer the call and lean his chair back on two legs. 

“What’s up?” he says in greeting. Somehow he seems more at ease now than before. “No, I’m not doing anything. I’m never doing anything… Life is boring, actually… Well, you’ve never been sent to prison. Oh, yes it is.”

Shireen continues to look over at him. He has a habit of running a hand through his hair occasionally, messing up his hair even though she’s certain that he never combed it in the first place. He talks facing the window, and she can see one of his feet resting on the edge of the desk, tapping out some unknown rhythm.

“Yeah, no,” he says loudly. He glances over to her and gives her a sheepish smile. “I don’t exactly want to go back. Maybe. We’ll see. Ask me next week. Yeah… okay then. Bye.”

He hangs up the phone, and Shireen pretends that she hadn’t been staring at him. She starts drawing circles into his bedsheets. “Is your girlfriend checking up on you?” she asks.

Rickon rolls his eyes. “I don’t have a girlfriend,” he says. “And if you just wanted to know that, you could have asked.”

“Well, you’ve never gotten a phone call before,” Shireen says. “I’m thinking this was someone special. Not a girlfriend… so a boyfriend? That would explain why you aren’t hitting on me…”

“He already has a boyfriend, actually,” Rickon says. “That was my brother.”

“An elusive Stark sibling!” Shireen exclaims. “Please, tell me more. Anything is better than looking through your massive box of crap.”

“That was your idea.”

“Humor me.”

Rickon doesn’t say anything for a moment, but she hears the chair thump down on the floor loudly. “Let’s go somewhere,” he says suddenly.

“Where is there to go?” Shireen asks. “I’m only here because you have a TV, even though there’re only three channels on it.”

“Then, let’s go,” Rickon repeats, walking toward the door. “Come on, moocher. Get off my bed.”

Shireen stays down until he pulls her out by the wrist. Then, she goes slowly, dragging her feet. Once they hit grass, Rickon breaks into a run. Shireen chases after him half-heartedly. He runs over to one of the few trees decorating the lawn and collapses in front of it.

“Loser,” Shireen says, sitting next to him. “Now, we’re bored and outside. What has this accomplished?”

“I needed to run, asshole,” Rickon says. He spreads out flat on his back. “Sometimes it’s good for stress relief.”

“What stress is this?” Shireen asks, pulling out a few blades of grass and dropping them on his face.

Rickon doesn’t bother to move them. “My brother wants me to go home for Thanksgiving,” he says. “And I’d really rather not. It’s not the friendliest environment.”

“Why? What’s your brother like?”

“Oh, Bran’s great,” Rickon says. He tosses his arms out to the side and takes a deep breath. “He’s crazy smart, and he does a bunch of stuff with his boyfriend all the time. We used to go hiking and stuff together. Just the two of us.”

“Not anymore?” Shireen asks, adding more grass to him.

“He can’t really walk anymore,” Rickon says. “Now, it’s just video games, and that’s if my parents decide that I’m allowed to play them.”

“I’m sorry,” Shireen says. She stops tearing out the grass and leans against the tree.

Rickon huffs out a deep breath before sitting up and brushing the grass off of him. “I just needed to feel sorry for myself,” he says. “We can go back now.”

“We weren’t doing anything anyway,” Shireen replies. “We can easily do nothing out here. Besides, this might be the last time we can see grass.”

Rickon groans. “It’s going to start snowing?”

Shireen nods. “At least then we can have snowball fights.”

“Oh, you are so going down.”

A few moments pass in silence with them just sitting next to each other. Rickon really likes spending these small moments with Shireen. She’s good company. She doesn’t try to fill gaps in conversation; she can enjoy silence. Rickon watches a breeze pick up some loose strands of her hair, but she doesn’t try to fix them. While Shireen seems to be self-conscious about her appearance around everyone else, she doesn’t have the same reservations with him. They just spend time together.

A part of Rickon thinks they should stop. He is spending far too much of his time looking at her. She’s just really nice to look at. Even with those scars that she hated, she’s still really cool. It isn’t helping him get over his massive crush on her, and he feels like he will be ruined by this.

“Do you hate the snow?” Shireen asks. Her voice is soft, and Rickon can feel himself being drawn in by the pleasant lull of it.

“Not really,” Rickon replies. He wipes the grass off his face to look at her better. “I just see it a lot.”

“It snows a lot where you’re from?” Shireen asked. Rickon thinks that she sounds like she’s about to fall asleep.

Rickon nods. He really looks at her, seeing her start to fix her hair and comb it out with her fingers. She’s looking off in the distance. For a moment, he thinks she’s lost in thought, before he realizes that she was looking over at a group of boys on the lawn. Filled with curiosity, Rickon looks over, trying to figure out who has captured her attention.

“I really like the snow,” Shireen murmurs.

Rickon glances up at her, but she still isn’t paying attention to him. Shireen is still adjusting her hair. Then, she freezes. Slowly, she raises a hand slightly and waves over at the group of boys. Rickon looks back over, but he doesn’t see anyone wave back. Punching down the feeling of unease and jealousy in his stomach, he tries to keep his voice casual. “Who is it?”

Shireen jumps, turning back to him. “Nothing.”

“You never fix your hair, so it’s gotta be someone special,” Rickon says. “One of those boys, probably. Should I go over and ask?”

“Don’t you dare!” Shireen snaps.

“Who is it?” Rickon asks. He pokes her in the arm for emphasis. “Who does Shireen Baratheon have a crush on?”

Her face immediately goes red, and she crosses her arms. “I don’t have a crush on anyone.”

Rickon stands up, brushing the grass off. He feels a renewed sense of determination—a new way to get to know her. “Then, there shouldn’t be any problem with me going over.”

He takes a few steps toward them before Shireen grabs at his ankle and trips him. “Just stay out of it, Stark,” she says.

“Tell me,” Rickon demands, rolling over in the grass to look at her.

“Why?” Shireen asks. She crosses her arms and levels a look at him. “Are you jealous?”

Rickon hopes that his face isn’t going red. He knows it would be all too easy for Shireen to realize that he likes her. After all, she seems to be fairly perceptive. “No way,” he says, trying to keep his voice normal. “But I could probably help you out. I am an expert on the working of the teenage boy’s mind, being one myself.”

Shireen scoffs. “Fine,” she concedes. “On one condition… we go back inside where no one can hear us.”

Rolling his eyes, Rickon agrees. Then, Shireen runs off. With a huff of breath, Rickon watches her hair bouncing with every step. For a stupid moment, he wishes his hands are the wind, so that he can get to feel her hair between his fingers. Rickon smiles to himself, watching Shireen sneak glances back at him. Then, he runs after her, knowing that he’ll be doing that for a very, very long time.

\--

“Edric Storm?” Rickon asks loudly, earning himself a harsh look for Shireen. “That stupid pretty boy who needs an entourage to make himself feel big?”

They’re back in his room. Shireen is fairly huddled up on his bed, legs crossed in front of her with her arms holding them together. She seems to be hiding. Rickon has re-claimed his seat at the desk, leaning over the back of the chair.

“Shut up,” Shireen says back. “He’s actually really nice, and I really like him.”

Rickon bites back a comment. There’s just something about the way Shireen lights up when she talks about him that Rickon can’t shoot down. “So why do you like him?”

“Because he’s smart and funny,” Shireen says, looking up at the ceiling in thought. “He also treats me like a normal person… you know… someone without all these gross-ass scars.”

“Really?” Rickon asks. “Has he even looked at them? Or acknowledged that they exist?”

“Some things are better left ignored,” Shireen says shortly. Rickon has a feeling that someone had told her that a lot in the past.

Rickon scoffs. “Come on, Shireen,” he says. “You don’t even touch them. I’ve seen how you act like they aren’t there.”

“And do _you_ look at them?” Shireen asks crossing her arms at him.

“All the time,” Rickon says honestly. Lately, he has even been thinking about how they would feel beneath his fingers.

“Whatever.” Shireen looks away, curling up even more. “It’s not like he wants to date some scarred up loser anyway. Fuck, I don’t even like them.”

Rickon watches her for a few minutes, letting her sit in her own thoughts. He doesn’t want to just spill his heart out to her and act like he’s everything she’s looking for. People don’t work like that. There aren’t any quick fixes in life. She probably needs to get through it herself first. Maybe he can help, though…

“Can I touch them?” he asks.

“Absolutely not,” Shireen says, rolling over to face him. Her hair is still over his pillow, leaving her face completely exposed. “You’ll probably get infected or something…”

Rickon stands up and turns his chair around to face her completely. “I’ll risk it,” he says, trying to give her a smile and sitting back down.

With a loud, exaggerated groan, Shireen sits up and moves to the edge of the bed. She crosses her arms and looks to the side, fully showing him the scarred flesh. Carefully, Rickon reaches a hand up. At the slightest touch of his fingers, she flinches away.

“Easy there,” he says. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

“Is that supposed to make me feel bad for slapping you?” Shireen asks. She still doesn’t look at him.

“You can slap me after this as payback,” Rickon says. He tries to catch some of that bright blue of her eyes and gets the smallest glimpse when she glances at him. Then, she lets out a heavy sigh, and Rickon reaches again.

This time, he fully presses the pads of his fingers over her cheek, feeling all the ridges and bumps of poorly-healed scar tissue. He slowly explores the edges where the scarred flesh hits the smooth parts, and he feels his stomach tighten. There’s something deeply intimate about this, about being someone let in close enough to feel this part of her that even she doesn’t acknowledge. Without meaning to, he reaches up a hand to press against her unblemished cheek. Shireen turns to him slowly, startled by the action. Rickon gives her a smile, looking directly into her eyes for the briefest of moments before staring at her scars. He lets himself see everything: the way her skin changes color, the small slivers that catch the light, the way her face flushes every time his fingers start moving, and the way her lips part when she breaths out a gentle sigh.

He wants to kiss her. Other than the fact that he knows he wanted to kiss her for weeks, he really wants to now. He might’ve tried, too, if she hadn’t just told him that she likes someone else. Running his thumbs over her cheekbones one last time, Rickon lets his hands fall. Then, he looks her in the eyes again. The pure black of her eyelashes outlines her eyes, making the blue seem even brighter this close. He looks back to her scars, and one of her hands jumps to them. Rickon notices that she never actually makes contact with them.

Her whole body shakes quickly, and Rickon thinks that she might cry. “Um, I should go,” she says suddenly. She stands up and rushes around the bed.

“You’re not going to slap me?” Rickon asks.

Shireen glances over to Rickon—the only person who has faced her flaws with unabashed curiosity and confidence. She bites her lip before walking back to face him directly. Her eyes are stinging with tears, and she finds that she can’t meet his eyes. With a deep breath, she raises a hand to slap him, but it loses power halfway through. Her hand collides with his cheek gently, and she just brushes her fingers against his jaw before running from the room.

As she runs, Shireen swipes blindly at her eyes. How could he? How could this boy just look at her like this hasn’t ruined her entire life? How dare he just accept her as if she wasn’t irreparably damaged? Shireen finally slows to a stop just outside her room. There was no way he was sincere. It wasn’t possible. Her own parents couldn’t look at her anymore. She has avoided her reflection for the greater part of the past seven years.

Collecting herself as much as possible, Shireen makes a detour to the communal bathroom. It’s still likely to be empty, and she’d be able to hate herself in peace. Standing in front of the mirror, Shireen forces herself to meet her own gaze. Slowly, she lifts a hand to her face. Her hand starts twitching so much, she can’t even control it. They aren’t there. They don’t exist. She is normal. She is fine. Shireen tries to rub at her face, but still can’t manage to touch her scars.

She isn’t normal. She isn’t fine. She’s damaged. She’s scarred. She’s ruined.

And nothing will make that better.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> By the way, I'll be MIA until Monday. Finally getting a mini-vacation!
> 
> I hope you liked this one though! Let me know what you think.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Picset](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com/post/125863088681/study-buddies-chapter-4)

It takes a full week for Shireen to look at Rickon normally again. He seems to notice this, keeping his distance for the most part. They still talk, but there isn’t the same level of comfort as before. Shireen finds that she misses it. Somehow, this boy has become her best friend, and she feels like she’s losing him even though he’s right next to her. Shireen is determined to make things better. She starts random conversations with him, getting him to talk casually about anything and everything. It doesn’t take a terribly long time for things to return to normal.

“You know, studying has got to be the biggest waste of time,” Rickon says. He tosses his pencil onto his desk and puts his head in his arms.

“Can’t manage to read anything twice?” Shireen asks, scribbling out a response to her homework.

“I just hate that it’s mandatory,” Rickon says. “Can’t we just pretend to be studying?”

“As long as you pass all your tests,” Shireen says firmly.

“Great.” Rickon jumps up from his seat, pulling out his laptop. “Let’s watch a movie, then.”

Shireen bites back a smile, putting her work away and lounging back on Rickon’s bed. He’s leaning onto it slightly, scrolling through something on his computer. He bites his lip and brushes his hair out of his eyes.

“What do you want to watch?” Rickon asks, looking up at her.

“Oh, we should watch _Easy A_ ,” Shireen says.

Rickon makes a face. “That chick flick?”

Shireen smacks his arm. “It’s funny and can actually teach you something relevant for class.”

“Yeah, but no one dies in it,” Rickon says. “I’d like to see something with some more blood and guts.”

“Ew.” Shireen falls back into the bed, leaving him to his own devices. After a moment, he hooks up his laptop to the TV, fitting the settings to it. Shireen looks up and sees a movie that doesn’t look bloody or gutsy. She grins over at Rickon, bouncing her feet happily. “Really?”

“Blood and guts next time,” Rickon says firmly. He starts climbing onto the bed, nudging her over. “Let me have some of my bed back.”

“No,” Shireen says firmly. She rolls onto her stomach and spreads out her arms and legs to take up more space. “This is _my_ bed when I’m here.”

Rickon stops, but says firmly, “I am not watching some girly chick flick from the discomfort of my desk. Now, move over. Come on… I can’t be that bad in bed. Unless you’re just afraid I’ll ruin your virtue…” Shireen’s face goes a deep red, and she slowly rolls over to make space for him. Unfortunately, Rickon notices. “Are you blushing? _Oh…_ so you’re not a… Well then…”

“Fuck off,” Shireen says sharply.

“Uh huh... was it some stupid act of passion you regret or something?” Rickon asks, suddenly unable to resist.

“I had a boyfriend, you know,” Shireen says. It can’t possibly be that hard to believe that someone would actually like her.

Rickon is either set on teasing her or really wants to piss her off. “Uh huh.”

Shireen rises to meet him. “I did! He was really nice.”

“Oh, I’m sure,” Rickon says. He turns back to watch the video buffer. “I suppose he was a good proper gentleman who buys condoms one at a time?”

“Really?” Shireen asks, slightly annoyed that he’s pressing the matter.

“Hey, no pressure that way,” Rickon says, looking back to her. “And a chance to... What... see if you were worth it?”

“Asshole.”

“Sorry,” Rickon says quickly. It’s nice to have these easy-going moments with her again, even if she sounds like she’ll kill him after. When she continues not to say anything, Rickon decides to try again. “You're just going to leave it there?”

“Well, we're not together anymore so that probably answers your question,” Shireen says flatly, meeting his gaze.

“What a dick.”

Shireen sighs, allowing the memory to leave her. She doesn’t need to remember. It isn’t particularly worth it or anything. She just needs a distraction. “How about you?”

“How about me what?” Rickon asks.

“You buy condoms one at a time?” Shireen prompts.

Rickon smirks at her. “Asking about my sex life?”

“You asked about mine!” she shoots back.

“Well, mine doesn't exist,” Rickon says, turning back to the TV. “I was just curious.”

“No one pretty enough to bang here?” Shireen asks, deciding that he deserves some of his own treatment.

“Oh my gods.”

“I mean... I am positive that Wylla wants to fuck you, so you can jump on that.” Shireen has indeed watched the girl stare at Rickon for the better part of the last two weeks.

Rickon completely falters. “I'm not going to...”

“You don't know how?” Shireen asks. She presses on. “Need help? Should I give you a proper sex talk? Oh my gods. Do you even know how to use a condom? Am I going to have to teach you to protect you from the hazards of sex?”

Rickon’s face is bright red. “If you must know, I can get myself off just fine, and I don't need to go around fucking random girls.”

Shireen bites back her laughter. Watching Rickon get flustered is beyond amusing. “She'd probably date you,” Shireen says slowly. “You're pretty cute.”

“Oh, am I?” Rickon waggles his eyebrows at her.

Shireen feels the heat rising in her face. “Shut up.”

“No, I'm cute,” Rickon says, rolling onto his side to face her. “Please. Tell me more.”

“Go fuck yourself.”

“I mean... I just told you I _can_ get myself off, so...”

“My gods...”

“Can you?”

“Can I what?”

“Get yourself off.”

“Oh, my gods. Really?”

“I'll take that as a no.”

Shireen hits him flat against his chest. Rickon can’t stop the grin from spreading across his face.

“Hey, it's fine,” Rickon says nonchalantly. “I'm sure it's harder and stuff.”

Biting back a reprimand, Shireen decides to fight dirty. “And how hard is it for you? Hard time getting your hand around your dick?”

Rickon stares wide-eyed at her. “Really?”

“You started this!” Shireen snaps at him.

Shrugging, Rickon leans back onto his bed and says, “Well, apparently you can't finish so...”

Shireen tries her best to actually punch him.

“What? You need a vibrator or something?” Rickon asks.

She hits him again.

“Really,” Rickon says earnestly. “I can—”

Shireen punches him again, and Rickon feigns injury, moving away.

“Fine, fine,” Rickon says. “Though, you probably should teach me…”

Laughing, Shireen pushes herself up onto an elbow to look at him. “Really?”

“Well, I mean, the me stuff I can do,” Rickon says. He watches Shireen roll her eyes at him. He goes on anyway. “I just don’t know how girls manage themselves. Like, how do you actually finger a girl without it being weird?”

Shireen is positive that her face is bright red, but Rickon is looking at her with such sincerity that she finds that she can’t snap at him again. She takes a deep breath. “The only advice you get from me,” she says. Rickon turns to face her eagerly. “If you’re going to finger some girl… use your tongue.”

“But isn’t that—?”

“That’s all I’m telling you,” Shireen says. She needs to find a way to cool down her body temperature. Why the fuck hasn’t this movie finished buffering yet?

Luckily, Rickon doesn’t press the topic. He just sits still, giving her sly glances, and Shireen is sure that it’s because she’s still blushing. The movie starts soon after, and Rickon gets distracted by talking incessantly over the movie. He makes a comment on _everything_ , and Shireen is sure that she would have strangled him if she hadn’t seen the movie before. Still, he doesn’t try to relate the movie to their previous talk at all, and for that she is extremely grateful.

Despite his earlier protests, Rickon seems to be genuinely enjoying the movie. He gets all of the jokes, and he even tells them back to her. Shireen tries not to be snappish with him. He’s still a couple years younger than her. She really should take him under her wing and make sure he doesn’t make any terrible decisions.

Once the movie finishes, Shireen finds Rickon grinning stupidly at her. He catches himself and looks away, clearing his throat. “So that wasn’t terrible,” he says.

“Uh uh,” Shireen replies. “Scared of ruining your macho demeanor?”

“Jerk.”

“Asshole.”

“Loser.”

“Bitch.”

Rolling his eyes, Rickon says, “Get out of here so I can shower now. Find your crush and creep on him or something.”

Shireen smacks him against his chest. “That’s the last time I tell you something personal,” she says. “You owe me.”

“Alright, I owe you,” Rickon agrees. “Now, go away.”

Sticking her tongue out at him, Shireen gathers up her books and leaves the room. Rickon watches her go, waiting until the door locks itself. Then, he breathes out a sigh of relief. He wasn’t sure how he managed to get through any of that without trying to make a move on her. Something just possesses him to reach out for her and touch her when she’s near. He spends a large part of his time just holding himself back from acting on his feelings.

Slowly, he leaves his bed to the shower. Without meaning to, he finds himself thinking about her, and how she’s so quick to anger, but how pure her emotions are. But with all the things swimming around in his head, he can’t keep his thoughts clean. Maybe he should go get a girlfriend… That would at least make things easier. But the thought of knowing anyone as well as he knew her feels wrong somehow.

Rickon groans, putting forth a futile effort to push her from his mind.

\--

As far as Shireen is concerned, the only good thing about Thanksgiving break is that it means the semester is almost over. She really doesn’t want to be here any longer than necessary. Her only upside to being here for the long weekend is that snow is finally falling freely. Shireen has been spending more and more time dragging Rickon out into the snow and trying to start snowball fights with him. They even tried to build an igloo once. Putting on a heavy jacket, Shireen makes her way over to Rickon’s room. Everyone else is in the process of leaving or already gone, and she is going to get bored soon. At least she can spend the time bothering and poking fun at him.

Rounding the corner into the hall, Shireen finds someone knocking on Rickon’s door. She stops, just observing them. The guy looks a lot like Rickon, with the same auburn hair, though his is cut and combed. He’s also slightly broader than Rickon, more muscle where Rickon is lanky. After a minute, Rickon’s door opens. Shireen presses a hand to her mouth to stifle her laughter. They definitely look like different versions of one another. There’s a small moment when they just talk. Then, Rickon disappears in his room again.

Shireen watches older Rickon wander the hallway, settling against a wall with his arms crossed. He doesn’t seem to notice her at all. When Rickon reappears, he has a duffle bag with him. He’s actually going home for Thanksgiving. She tries not to be disappointed. Another Thanksgiving alone won’t be terrible. She’s done it before. However, she had been looking forward to having someone to share it with.

Shireen is so lost in thought that she doesn’t notice Rickon walk up to her. He waves a hand in front of her face to get her attention.

“Hey, what’s up?” he asks.

Shireen lets out a dramatic sigh. “Just realizing that you’re abandoning me,” she says. She leans her head onto the wall next to her, still looking over at Rickon. “I suppose the home-cooked meal was too much to resist with your clone over there?”

“My brother,” Rickon corrects. He grins down at her. “And I didn’t realize that you wanted me so much. You could have said something.”

“By all means, please go and enjoy your time with your family,” Shireen says. “At this rate, they might pull you out of this hell hole.”

Rickon looks around awkwardly, glancing back to his brother who is now on the phone and looking at them strangely. He turns back to Shireen and says, “Um, you could come with us, I guess.”

Shireen laughs, leaning against the wall. “No, it’s fine. I think I can manage a few days without you.” There’s a moment when they’re just standing there, not even looking at each other. Rickon lets out a heavy sigh, glancing back at his brother who is walking over now. “Well,” Shireen says abruptly. “Enjoy your weekend in wherever, I guess.”

“Winterfell,” Rickon supplies, still distracted.

“What?” Shireen asks. She looks back at Rickon with wide eyes. Winterfell is her dream school. She has worked three times harder on her application to that university than anywhere else. Visiting the campus was something she has always wanted to do. She feels her heart start beating faster.

“I’m from Winterfell,” Rickon says again, looking back at her.

Shireen bounces on her feet, looking eagerly at him. This could be her only chance. “Take me with you,” she blurts out.

“What?” Rickon asks.

“Please?” she begs. “You don’t even have to take care of me. I’ll stay on the streets or whatever. I just want to visit the university.”

“Okay, nerd,” Rickon snorts.

Shireen hits him. “I’m serious!” she says. “That’s my dream school. I’ll spend the whole time on campus, and you can pretend I don’t exist.”

Rickon is looking at her incredulously when his brother comes over. “Rickon,” he calls.

“Yeah, Robb?” Rickon responds turning to his brother.

“Mom did say you could invite a friend over,” Robb says, putting his phone back in his pocket. 

Shireen looks at Rickon expectantly. “You did just invite me,” she reminds him, batting her eyelashes at him. 

“Yeah, because I thought you’d say no,” Rickon shoots back.

“Please?” she asks.

“You don’t want to do this,” Rickon whispers sharply.

“ _You owe me_ ,” Shireen shoots back. There’s a deadly look in her eyes when she narrows them at him, making the corners scrunch up.

Letting out a loud groan, Rickon throws his head back. “Fine,” he concedes. “Go get your things.”

Shireen squeals. Then, she jumps up, throwing her arms around his neck. “Thank you!” she nearly shouts in his ear. Before she lets go, Shireen plants a kiss on his cheek. Then, she races off back to her room.

“She’s cute,” Robb says, feigning an attempt at casual conversation.

“Cradle robber,” Rickon says back, glaring at his brother. Robb laughs, picking up Rickon’s duffle bag and gesturing for him to lead the way to her room. Rolling his eyes and shoving his hands into his pockets, Rickon starts on his way over to Shireen’s room. He has only been over once before. That time, her roommate had yelled at him to get lost, and he wasn’t exactly keen on fueling her anger even more.

The door to her room hasn’t been shut properly, so Rickon lets himself in. He can practically hear Robb reprimanding him. “Hey, loser,” Rickon calls into the room. “You ready to go?”

Shireen has a good-sized duffle bag at her feet. She zips it up and looks at Rickon with a huge smile. “Ready,” she says, beaming at him.

Rolling his eyes at her, Rickon goes further into the room to grab her bag and sling it over his body. Shireen still seems to be bouncing on her feet. Rickon curses Robb for linking the word ‘cute’ with her. He was having a hard enough time trying to not have a crush on her. She also has a different sort of flush to her skin that is entirely from her excitement, and Rickon really wants to feel it under his fingers. He grips the bag to distract himself. “Let’s go, then.”

Shireen doesn’t stop grinning for the entire drive to Winterfell. Rickon does his best not to stare at her. He can practically feel Robb glancing over to him at every possibility. Still, he can feel her energy radiating off of her, and it is incredibly infectious. Rickon breathes out a sigh of relief when they stop to pick up Robb’s girlfriend Dacey. He just hopes that the med student won’t start asking questions about Shireen’s scars. They start up an amiable conversation in the car; Shireen and Dacey getting along quite well. When they get close enough to see Winterfell University, Shireen grabs onto Rickon’s hand. He can feel his face burning, and Robb is staring at him through the rear-view mirror.

He mouths a “fuck off” at his brother and looks pointedly out the window. Shireen is still talking excitedly at him, and he gives her blasé responses. She isn’t put-off, though, and she keeps on pointing things out to them. Rickon braces himself for her exclamations at the Stark house. He’s dreading the very obvious sign of his family’s wealth.

When the renovated castle comes into view, Shireen doesn’t seem to realize that it’s their destination. It isn’t until they’re halfway up the drive that Shireen’s jaw drops. She turns to Rickon very intensely. “You’re joking.”

“Speak for yourself, Baratheon,” Rickon says, looking back at her.

“I don’t live in a fucking castle,” she says, ducking down to see up the battlements. She looks back, seeing the expectant look on Rickon’s face. Then, she shakes her head at him.

“It’s not _technically_ a castle,” Robb says from the front seat.

Dacey hits his arm. “Shut up,” she says. “It’s totally a castle.”

Rickon looks over at Shireen, seeing her excitement shine through her disbelief. This is probably his only chance to see her honest appraisal. Once his family gets to her, he’ll have to spend the whole time getting them to believe that they aren’t dating. That is going to be extremely difficult.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Picset](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com/post/126153087351/study-buddies-chapter-5)

Shireen is entirely in shock at seeing the Stark home. Never in her entire life did she think that she would get to see a castle, much less stay in one. Immediately, she puts her best foot forward, greeting everyone with pleasantries and smiles, hoping she can manage her manners for the duration of her stay. Rickon’s parents definitely seem to like her, helping her to a guest room and showing her around. Shireen grins at Rickon when they offer her a full tour of Winterfell’s university, and he mimes gagging at her. Resisting the urge to stick her tongue out at him, Shireen turns to his parents with a warm smile.

“Thank you so much, Mr. and Mrs. Stark,” Shireen says. She can see Rickon rolling his eyes in her periphery. “I’m so sorry for coming over on such short notice.”

“Call me Catelyn, dear,” his mother says. “And you are more than welcome to visit whenever you’d like.”

“Thank you,” Shireen calls, watching his parents disappear down the hall. She grins to herself, spinning in the room and walking over to the bed. Just before she sits down, Rickon flops onto it. “Hey!”

“Kiss ass,” Rickon says, sticking his tongue out at her.

“They’re really nice,” Shireen says, sitting on the corner of the mattress. “And I’m welcome to come over whenever.”

“Congratulations,” Rickon responds flatly. “They officially like you more than they like me.”

Shireen frowns, pushing her hair behind her ear to get a better look at him. Rickon is staring up at the ceiling, and he has a hard frown on his face. Shireen places a hand flat on his chest and shakes him. “Hey,” she says. “At least we can have some fun while I’m here?”

Rickon rolls his eyes, sitting up. “Yeah, I guess,” he says. “But if you kiss up to my entire family, I’m going to have to get rid of you.”

“I’m welcome here anyway,” Shireen sing-songs, rocking from side to side.

Rickon gently shoves her shoulder. “Come on, loser,” he says, standing up. “I’ve got a lot more family for you to meet.”

Unfortunately for Rickon, Shireen is excellent at talking to his family and greeting them politely. She already gets along with Robb and Dacey from the drive here, but he is honestly expecting more slip-ups from her, especially given how rude and short she can be with people at Skagos. Rickon watches her offer help to his mother as she prepares food for tomorrow and resists the urge to poke fun at her.

Walking back to the front room, Rickon notices Bran and Jojen coming up the drive. He opens the door for them and watches Bran hobble quickly toward him. Bran’s completely overjoyed. “You came!” he calls, dropping his crutches to hug his brother. “It’s been too long!”

“You know, you can visit me,” Rickon points out. “And since it’s not a prison, you should have no problems with it.”

Jojen puts a hand on Rickon’s shoulder before handing Bran his crutches. “I dunno,” he says slowly. “Apparently, you’ve been having a lot of fun without visitors.”

Rickon rounds on his brother. “You told him?”

“Oh, who is he going to tell?” Bran counters, moving further into the house. He goes straight to the living room and settles onto the couch. Jojen takes a seat next to him, lounging about.

“You seriously can’t mention it,” Rickon says.

“You’ve gotta calm down,” Bran says, shaking his head. “It’s not like having a crush on someone is the end of the world.”

“It’s not that, it’s—” Rickon freezes. Shireen is standing in the doorway with a huge grin on her face. She looks like she had just won the lottery. “ _Fuck._ ”

Bran and Jojen turn simultaneously to see Shireen skipping into the room. She goes straight up to Rickon and sways back and forth on the balls of her feet. “Who do you have a crush on?” she asks, grinning.

“Aren’t you going to say hi to my family?” Rickon says, gesturing to Bran and Jojen.

“Hi!” Shireen says quickly and dismissively before turning immediately back to Rickon. “Tell me.”

“No,” Rickon snaps at her.

Shireen starts to poke at his arm. “I’ll figure it out sooner or later,” she says. “Now, tell me,”

“Fine, it’s Wylla,” Rickon says, naming the first girl who comes to mind. “Now, would you back off?”

“I knew it!” Shireen practically squeals. “Don’t worry! I won’t tell anyone. Promise.”

As Shireen skips from the room, Rickon falls into one of the empty couches. Bran and Jojen have looks of mild amusement on their faces. Then, Shireen runs back into the room. She goes in front of Bran and extends her hand to him.

“Sorry,” she says quickly. “I must have been distracted by something. Hi, I’m Shireen. You must be Bran.”

Rickon grabs one of the throw pillows from the couch and throws it at her. “Stop pretending, you faker!” he calls, readying another pillow. He throws it at her, but she side-steps away. Jojen starts laughing when Shireen picks up a fallen pillow and chucks it back at Rickon.

Shireen quickly turns to Jojen. “I’ll meet you later,” she says quickly before running off.

“Sorry, bro,” Bran says quickly. “I didn’t realize you brought her home with you.”

“Shut up,” Rickon sighs, slumping further back.

“I’ll cover for you?” Bran offers.

“Oh, _you owe me_ ,” Rickon corrects, retrieving the pillows and putting them back on the couch. Right when he sits down again, his mother comes into the room.

Catelyn immediately throws her arms around Bran and kisses his hair. “You didn’t even come say hi!” she says.

“Bran got tired from the walk,” Jojen says easily. “You know how it gets.”

Rickon gives Jojen a weak smile. Then, Catelyn turns to him. “Aren’t you going to go get Shireen and introduce her to your brother?” she asks pointedly.

“Sure,” Rickon says, slowly leaving the room. He walks slowly into the kitchen, seeing Shireen leaning over the counter of the island, resting her chin in her palms.

“So Wylla, huh?” she asks, grinning at him.

“Shut up and go pretend to meet my brother for the first time,” Rickon says, crossing his arms. He leans back against a cupboard.

Shireen gets a wicked grin on her face. “Remember when you told me to stop pretending?”

“Remember when you said you’d live on the streets the whole weekend?” Rickon shoots back.

Pouting at him, Shireen circles the island, walking slowly toward him. “Fine,” she says. “And I’ll even help you get with Wylla once we get back to school.”

“My dream come true,” Rickon deadpans, shoving Shireen down the hallway. Laughing, Shireen goes back down the hallway, going to greet Bran and Jojen properly.

Rickon seriously doesn’t think that introductions could go any worse. Shireen seems to be watching her behavior even more, stepping around him while meeting his sisters. She doesn’t tease him or poke fun at him at all throughout the evening. She does, however, continuously sneak sly glances at him. Rickon chooses to ignore her completely until the next day, but Shireen surprises him by jumping onto his bed that night.

“Can I have your bed?” she asks, crawling over it and laying down beside him.

Rickon narrows his eyes at her. He isn’t sure what kind of game she’s playing, but he’s not particularly interested in playing right now. “No.”

“Alright, then tell me about Wylla,” Shireen says, rolling onto her back and not moving from the bed.

Sitting up, Rickon throws off his blankets and makes to leave the room.

“Okay, I’m sorry,” she calls. “You can have your bed, and I won’t tease you about your crush, deal?”

Slowly, Rickon goes back on his bed, burrowing under his blankets. He slumps down into the pillows and turns to face her.

Shireen huffs out a breath and mimics his movements, turning to face him. “I’m just really excited about being here,” she mumbles. “My family doesn’t do stuff like this, and I don’t exactly have any other friends.”

Letting out a sigh, Rickon rolls onto his back. “You’re lucky, then,” he says. “Dealing with everyone when I was being punished for everything sucked. It almost made it worse that I was the only child being treated like that.”

“They like you now,” Shireen points out.

“They haven’t offered to get me away from Skagos, though,” Rickon says.

Shireen’s face falls, and she looks down at the pillows. “You want to leave me?” she murmurs. “You’re my only friend, Rickon. And soon you’ll have your Wylla, and I’ll just be alone again.”

“I’m not abandoning you,” Rickon says, reaching out to grab her hand. “Besides, with any luck, we’ll both be in Winterfell next year.”

Shireen laughs, pressing her free hand to her stomach. “Oh, maybe we should date then,” she says. Rickon feels his heart skip a beat. “It’s like we were destined for each other.”

Rickon wants to agree with her, but then she starts laughing loudly. The way she’s laughing at the idea of it really puts him off. He doesn’t need her to make fun of him for having a crush on her and being so much younger than her. Shireen doesn’t stop, though, and she presses a hand onto his hip, sliding up close to him.

“Could you imagine?” she asks through her laughter. “Instead of watching movies and studying in your room, we could be having make out sessions.”

Rickon tries not to be annoyed with her flippant comments when he’s been daydreaming about exactly that happening. He ignores her hand on his hip the best he can and is grateful that the blankets are covering him. Instead, he rolls his eyes at her. “Alright, loser,” he says. “Let’s date, then. We’ll forget about your Edric and my Wylla, and just go for it.”

Shireen laughs even harder, and Rickon suppresses a wince. “Oh, I don’t think so,” she says. “You’re my best friend. I’m not ruining that.”

“Well, I’m a best friend who isn’t trying to abandon you,” Rickon says, meeting her eyes.

“So you’re not mad at me for poking fun?” Shireen asks, batting her eyelashes at him.

The urge to touch her face again is building in his chest. His hand lifts up weakly before falling between them. Shireen catches the motion and raises her eyebrows at him. Rickon just shakes his head. Then, he bites his lip. “Would you be mad if I asked?”

“Asked about what?” Shireen says, shuffling onto her elbow to look at him. “Edric again?”

Shaking his head slowly, Rickon copies her movement. Carefully, he reaches for her scarred cheek. Shireen takes a deep breath but doesn’t flinch away. He brushes his knuckles over the scars. “I meant these.”

“Oh.” Shireen takes a deep breath and turns away, flopping down on her back. “I had chickenpox as a child.”

Rickon frowns. “Yeah, me too.”

Shireen shakes her head. “My mom read somewhere about an herbal remedy that would make it go away quicker,” she explains. “And it did… technically. The scars never faded, though… so now I’m stuck looking like a freak.” She gives him a sarcastic grin and sits up.

Rickon follows her up, placing a hand on her back. “You know,” he says slowly. “I only pick the prettiest people to be my friends.”

Laughing, Shireen turns back to face him. “I think there might be something wrong with your vision,” she says. Shireen stretches her arms up, arching her back. “Or you’re doomed by the friend code to tell me that I actually look decent.”

“Or… you’re actually just really pretty,” Rickon shoots back.

“So I actually have a chance with Edric?” she asks, sneaking a sly glance at him and biting her lip.

Rickon forces back a groan. Instead, he lets out a sigh. “Yup,” he says. “You do.”

Shireen laughs again. Then, she throws her arms around his neck. “You’re too nice to me,” she says. “But thank you.”

Rickon hugs her back briefly before pulling away. Then, he pushes her back down to the bed. “Alright,” he says. “Go ahead and steal my bed. I’ll take the guest room.”

“You don’t have to,” Shireen says quickly, sitting up.

Rickon is already at the door. “I thought you said that my bed was yours whenever you were here?”

“In your room,” Shireen mumbles, toying with her hair.

“This is my room,” Rickon points out. “Don’t worry about it.”

A part of Rickon had hoped that she would follow him back to the other bed, but he’s happy just to watch the smile creep onto her face when she crawls under the blankets. Faintly, he hears her mumble out a “goodnight” when he closes the door. Closing his eyes tight, Rickon forces his way to the guest room. However, he’s stopped when Jojen pulls him into Bran’s room.

“Did you seriously not tell her?” Bran demands. “After she willingly went to your room?”

Rickon rolls his eyes. “She does that all the time,” he says, going over to sit on the bed. “It doesn’t mean anything. Besides, she has a crush on someone else.”

Jojen winces. “Dude, I’m sorry,” he says. “Maybe she’ll come around?””

“I can only hope,” Rickon replies. “It’ll probably be easier to get past this once we get back to school.”

“You actually want to go back?” Bran asks, sitting up.

“Shut up,” Rickon shoots at him. “I’m going to sleep now.”

\--

Shireen is extremely excited for Thanksgiving. She helps out all day, and is extremely polite throughout dinner. She intentionally doesn’t start up any conversations with the Starks, keeping an eye on Rickon and intervening when things look like they can go south for him. With some instance on her part, Rickon gets off on helping his family with cleanup, so he can show her around outside. Grinning at him, Shireen slowly kicks her way through the snow.

“That wasn’t so bad, right?” she asks, knocking sideways into him.

“I guess,” he says. “Thanks for getting me off cleanup, though. I usually get suckered into it for being the bad child…”

“From what Sansa told me, you’re not even the worst,” Shireen says, laughing as she remembered Sansa dishing out every detail of the Stark family.

Rickon grins at her. “Sure, I am,” he said. “I mean, I got caught.”

Shireen laughs at him, continuing to roam the snow. Rickon follows at a distance. Taking careful steps, Shireen begins walking with purpose. She tries to keep her pace the same but Rickon notices. “What are you doing?” he asks, still following her.

“I’m going to see if your family will notice if I draw a dick in the snow,” she says.

Rickon stops in his steps, looking around. Shireen is already fairly far along. She glances back to him and grins. Rickon stops following her and starts walking aimlessly around.

“You’re ruining my picture!” she calls, rolling a snowball in her hands and throwing it at him.

“You’re trying to get me in trouble,” Rickon says in return. “You think my family is going to believe that _you_ did it? With your precious, perfect ‘I’m-so-cute-and-sweet’ act?”

Shireen glares at Rickon. Then, she scoops up another snowball and throws it at his head. Rickon ducks, letting the snow scatter in his hair. He shakes his head roughly, shaking off the excess snow. Grinning, Shireen slowly reaches down for another handful of snow. Rickon narrows his eyes at her, shaking his head slightly. Ignoring him, Shireen smirks and begins packing the snow together. She holds it out, tossing it gently in her hand as if it were a baseball.

“Don’t you dare,” Rickon warns.

Shireen throws the snowball.

Rickon dodges the throw, running forward in the snow to tackle her down. He catches her about the waist, and they fall together into the deep snow. Shireen laughs hard, shoving Rickon off and going to build an arsenal of snowballs. Rickon follows suit, rushing off to a different corner of the snow-covered area and making a few quick snowballs. Shireen hides out near the house, holding onto the snowballs by any means, stuffing the bulk of them onto her left arm to keep the right open for throwing. Slowly, she creeps back into the clearing, holding a snowball at the ready.

She’s hit by a solid blow to her arm, the padding of her coat taking the bulk of the damage. Rounding on Rickon, Shireen begins to throw her snowballs relentlessly. With a completely different strategy, Rickon hasn’t stocked up on ammunition. He simply relies on the floor to provide snow when needed. Unfortunately, he has a lot more experience making snowballs than Shireen, and he easily pelts her back for every one she throws at him.

They continue until the moon is out, and they both collapse in the snow. Shireen is breathing heavily, feeling overheated in her heavy winter clothes. Unzipping her jacket, she rolls over to face Rickon. “And no more dicks,” she says. She keeps a straight face for a short time before bursting into laughter.

“Good,” Rickon shoots back. He grabs a handful of snow, and tosses the loose powder at her. “Shouldn’t have any coming from you anyway.”

Shireen sticks out her tongue at him, digging an arm into the snow to spray him with it. Rickon doesn’t bother moving away, letting her pile the snow on top of him. After a few minutes, he turns to face her, meeting her bright blue eyes with his icy ones. Shireen feels her breath shorten, catching in the back of her throat. She swallows hard and looks up to the sky. The stars look a thousand times brighter here than they are at Skagos. “Do you think it’ll snow while we’re here?”

Rickon shrugs, rolling through the snow and separating his self from her. “Judging by the lack of clouds, I’m going to have to go with no,” he says. “But maybe you can pray to the gods for a miracle.”

“What if they give me the wrong miracle?” she asks.

“How can there be a _wrong_ miracle?” Rickon asks back. “Aren’t they all magic or something?”

“I’m sure some of them suck.” Shireen sits up, looking up at the sky. She doesn’t want to remember the unfortunate series of events that made her life the way it was. She didn’t even have a family that wanted her around for the holidays. She sighs deeply, letting the cold air fill her lungs. “Just like my stupid chicken pox remedy.”

“It’s not so bad.” Rickon also sits up, shaking some of the snow off his jacket. He starts tracing a finger through the snow, drawing a picture. “I mean, I got to meet you.”

A feeling of warmth washes over Shireen, filling her up and making her feel even hotter than before. She chuckles, shaking off the feeling. “Maybe you’re my miracle,” she says, glancing over at Rickon. “The gods just sent me a best friend.”


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Picset](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com/post/126443006091/study-buddies-chapter-6)

Rickon asks Wylla out the second he sees her at Skagos. It happens to be on the way to his room, right after dropping off Shireen at her dorm, and he almost hates that he promised himself that he would ask her out, but Shireen had very explicitly taken to calling him her friend for the rest of the break particularly when his family was around. Still, Wylla is almost overly enthusiastic about it, jumping up and down and hugging him tightly. She takes his hand in a vice-like grip, and he can feel all her rings and bracelets digging into his skin. She’s dyed her hair over the break to an almost-neon green, and she can’t stop talking about how great of a decision it was because it caught his attention. Rickon does his best to smile and nod, wishing that Shireen had somehow decided he was anything _but_ just her friend.

Still, Wylla is so nice about dating him that he feels bad for asking her out just because. Rickon asks her out to a movie later that week before leaving to unpack from the break. He lets out a sigh when he finally closes the door to his room. He spent a grand total of five minutes with her so far, and it is exhausting. He hopes that she’ll calm down soon.

She doesn’t. Wylla is positively bouncing with energy every time she sees Rickon. She presses up against him at every opportunity, hugging him and touching him with such possessiveness that he feels like he is slowly becoming her _thing_. It grates on him, but leaves his mind when she kisses him.

Rickon had never kissed anyone before, and while it was nothing like he expected, he still enjoys it. Wylla likes to use her tongue more than anything, leaving his mouth filled with her saliva. And while it’s sloppy and a little bit gross, Rickon can’t help feeling like maybe he _should_ be dating her anyway.

Shireen laughs at him without remorse when he tells her about how Wylla kisses. She gets a stitch in her side and continues on anyway, doubling over on his bed while he finishes recounting the story.

“Oh, that is _rich_ ,” Shireen says. “Gods, that probably feels like having a slug in your mouth.”

Rickon shrugs, trying not to look at Shireen for so long. “It’s not too bad,” he says. “And she’s getting better.”

Shireen wipes a tear from her eye, still looking like she’ll fall into a fit of laughter at any moment. “And I take it the sex is even better?”

“Gods, Shireen.” Rickon pulls a pillow out from under her to hit her with it. “I’m dating her, not fucking her.”

“Is it because you need to go buy condoms?” Shireen asks. “I’m sure my roommate can help you out with that. I think she keeps trying to fuck her boyfriend when I’m gone.”

Rickon snorts. “Is that why you’re here so often?”

“You want to spend all your spare time listening to someone have loud sex and making out with someone at every opportunity?” Shireen asks. When Rickon doesn’t respond other than making a face, she says, “Yeah, I thought so. All her orgasms are faked anyway. Speaking of which, you better let your girlfriend finish before you do.”

Rickon ignores Shireen, finally using her own tactics against her and sticking his nose in a book. Shireen giggles at him before continuing on with studying.

If anything, Rickon’s just glad that Shireen still hangs out with him now that Wylla’s trying to eat up all of his spare time. She constantly seeks him out in the hallways, as if she’s trying to choke him with her tongue, and she continuously presses her breasts up against him. He might’ve taken the advances, too, if he didn’t feel so awkward about how public she wanted their relationship to be. On the day of their date to the movies, she goes so far as trying to unzip his pants in the hallway before Rickon realizes what she’s doing and pulls away, claiming that he’ll be late to a study session. He runs away, mostly embarrassed that such a small action could get him half-hard in the first place. It isn’t until Shireen eyes his zipper that he notices he hadn’t done it up properly.

Luckily, Shireen doesn’t say anything until he starts dressing to leave that night. She glances up at him while he’s trying to put on a tie. “Bad decision,” she says slowly. “You shouldn’t wear that.”

“Are you against me looking nice?” Rickon asks.

“I’m against you being strangled to death by a girl who thinks pulling on ties is sexy,” Shireen says, putting down her book. “Although, as horny as Wylla seems, you might want to just go naked.”

“Not happening,” Rickon says, tossing the tie down. He’s only in jeans and a somewhat nice shirt now, and he feels like it isn’t the best idea. “And could you please not flippantly call my girlfriend horny?”

“Hey, at least she likes you,” Shireen responds. “I mean, she _did_ try to give you a blowjob earlier.”

Rickon feels his face get hot. “You weren’t—”

“Your zipper,” Shireen says. “Do you think I’m not paying attention to you two so actively trying to fuck each other without actually doing it?”

“I’m not trying to—” Rickon is interrupted by a knock at the door.

“Do you want me gone when you get back?” Shireen asks. “I’m sure Wylla’s going to jump your bones as soon as the opportunity presents itself, and you’re in a single.”

Rickon ignores Shireen, shoving his phone and wallet into his pockets before leaving. Unfortunately, Shireen appears to be right. Wylla spends every moment she can trying to kiss him, nearly making them late for the movie. Then, Rickon regrets asking her to something he actually wanted to see when she moves onto his lap the second the lights dim. Of all experiences, he really didn’t want his memory of _Mad Max_ being having Wylla grinding her ass on him the entire time, even after he came in his jeans. But she is persistent, kissing him every few minutes and making it seem like a massive waste of twenty dollars. Rickon is mostly annoyed by the end of it, but he lets himself focus on the good: how she is steadily becoming less of a sloppy kisser, how she focuses her attention on him, how great it felt when she made him orgasm. Rickon decides that it won’t be so bad after all. He’ll just have to watch his choices a bit better.

Wylla nearly invites herself over to his room, but Rickon prevents her from doing so by walking her to hers. He pins her against the wall and kisses her as hard as he can, trying to make her feel like she got some kind of finality from the date. She seems satisfied enough when she enters her room, and Rickon heads back to his own.

Rickon sighs, finding Shireen asleep on his bed, fully bundled up under the sheets. He can’t stop the grin from spreading across his face, and he lets her keep sleeping, changing out of his jeans and immediately going to do his laundry. By the time the load has finished, he’s read through his assignment for English, and heads back to his room feeling accomplished, even though it’s nearing two in the morning.

Shireen’s still completely asleep when he gets back, and he gently nudges her awake.

“Shit,” she breathes out, bleary-eyed and yawning. “I wasn’t supposed to…” 

She trails off, looking up at Rickon. He smiles at her, ready to laugh at how terrible she is at planning. “I thought you wanted the coast to be clear for me.”

“You wanted to fuck her?” Shireen asks. “Because if you brought her back, I was the ultimate cock-block, _and_ she probably dumped your ass.”

“I didn’t bring her back,” Rickon says, rolling his eyes slightly. 

Shireen nods and stretches, gathering up her things from studying earlier. “My roommate was kind enough to text me and let me know that she was going to spend the evening fucking her boyfriend,” Shireen explains. “I just wanted to take a nap before heading back. She was supposed to text me when she was done.”

Just then, Shireen’s phone chimes with a text. She lets out a loud groan and Rickon laughs. “I guess it’s clear for you to head back?” he asks. “Do you want me to walk you?”

“No, thanks,” Shireen says through a yawn. “I’m not a dog.” And with that she leaves, waving to him as the door closes behind her.

It takes Rickon a moment to realize what she said, and then he can’t stop laughing. He almost texts her to let her know that he got the joke, but it’s been too long, and she really needs the sleep.

\--

“So you were seriously not dating her?” Wylla asks, seated on top of Rickon’s lap before class starts. Wylla is in the same study partner class that he’s in, though Rickon hadn’t really noticed her before.

“Yeah, no,” Rickon says. “We just got slumped together because we both didn’t get partners.”

“I would have partnered with you, baby,” Wylla says, kissing him on the cheek. Rickon can feel the stickiness of her lipstick residue there and he resists the urge to wipe it off immediately. “I just promised my friend that I wouldn’t leave her by herself.”

“It’s whatever,” Rickon says, looking around the room. He grinds his teeth, realizing that that was not what she wanted to hear.

“Oh, okay then,” she says coldly, hopping off his lap. “Since it’s just whatever, I’ll leave you to your partner.”

Wylla walks away slowly, intentionally swinging her hips as she goes. Rickon nearly rolls his eyes at her, but he’s distracted from doing so when he sees Shireen biting down a smile. “What?” he asks.

“You’ve been branded,” Shireen says, pointing at the lipstick mark on his cheek.

Rickon wipes it off quickly, rubbing furiously at his cheek to do so. Shireen just laughs at him, pulling out her homework to get ahead. Rickon notices Wylla staring at them the entire class period. He tries to focus on what he’s supposed to be doing, but he feels like her gaze is burning a hole into his back. Shireen notices her, too, and begins leaning over to touch Rickon’s knee every time she wants his attention.

“Are you trying to get me killed?” he asks sharply.

Shireen gives him an innocent smile and bats her eyelashes at him. “I just wanted you to know that six times eight is forty-eight, not fifty-two,” she says, pointing down at his math homework.

Rickon frowns, looking down at his paper. “Oh, I switched them up,” he says, erasing the answer and rewriting the entire problem. He glances over to find Wylla glaring at them.

“How on earth did you manage to get fifty-two?” Shireen asks. With a small huff, Rickon turns to explain that he accidently flipped the numbers three times while working out the problem. Shireen gives him a funny look and asks, “Are you dyslexic?”

“No,” he says. “At least, I don’t think so.”

“Then, you were distracted because of…” Shireen makes a tiny gesture with the tip of her pencil and Rickon doesn’t even bother to look back before nodding. She makes an exaggerated expression with her eyebrows and says, “Well, the devil this way she comes.”

“What?” Rickon asks just before he feels someone’s hands on his shoulders, kneading into them. He turns to face Wylla who immediately kisses him, even sloppier than before. She pulls away, and without thinking, Rickon wipes his face clean. Wylla raises an eyebrow at him, and he just says, “What?”

Wylla sighs, pouting her lips out and trailing her fingers over her shoulders. “I just wanted to ask if you wanted some time together after this,” she says slowly, obviously an attempt at seduction. “I can show you that thing with my tongue that I’ve been telling you about.”

Shireen snorts, trying to turn it into a cough but ending up laughing instead. Rickon is surprised that she didn’t start choking on that display of noise. Wylla gives her a murderous look. Shireen stuffs her nose into her book, feigning interest when Rickon knows she’s just eavesdropping. He doesn’t blame her. After all, Wylla walked up to them when she knew they were talking. “I think I have a study session after this,” Rickon says. “Sorry.”

“You can reschedule,” Wylla says, still keeping the lull in her voice. “Unless you’ve already agreed not to talk that much because she’s so—”

Shireen snaps her book shut loudly. “Whatever _she_ is, it isn’t deaf,” she shoots out. “So back the fuck off, and let me pass this class, okay?”

Wylla takes a step away before reaching out for Rickon’s hand. “I’ll see you after this class,” she says before skipping off.

Shireen’s blood is boiling. Regardless of whether Rickon liked this girl, she refuses to take insults about her appearance any longer. She is done being treated like trash just because her face is scarred and she is not going to put up with it. Letting out a heavy sigh, Shireen opens her book back up, failing at finding her spot because she’s so angry. She tosses the book in her bag and pulls out a worksheet for another class, scribbling out the answers as fast as possible. She can’t believe that that whore had the audacity to insult her so closely.

“What did you say?” Rickon asks, pulling her from her thoughts.

“Shit, did I say that out loud?” she says quickly, trying to cover her tracks. “I didn’t mean to… I was just…”

Rickon shrugs. “I get it,” he says. Then, he elbows her gently. “But I’m proud of you for sticking up for yourself.”

Shireen winces. “Even though it was at your girlfriend?”

“Hey.” Rickon levels a look at Shireen. “I’m going to dump each and every girl that thinks it’s okay to insult my best friend.”

“You’re going to end up single forever,” Shireen hisses out. She makes a worried face before turning back to her worksheet, much calmer than she was before. Rickon rolls his eyes at her, going back to his homework for the rest of the class. Shireen just continues on with her work, working through the bell to finish up her worksheet. As she’s packing her things, she sees Wylla approaching again and rushes out.

She wants to be supportive of Rickon’s first relationship, but she doesn’t trust herself to be in the same room as them when they start making out. Instead, she goes to the library. They didn’t actually have a planned study session today, and she’s thinking that Rickon probably wants the promised blowjob despite his response. He probably just doesn’t want her to know. Shireen works quietly for a few hours, finishing up all of her homework where there are no distractions.

The alone time is good for her, even if she was used to hanging out with Rickon during her free time. Now, she spends that time in the snow, making snow angels and forts outside. It makes her feel like a child, but she doesn’t care if everyone is judging her for this. There are worse things to be judged for. Shireen starts building up a mound of snow when Edric appears at her shoulder. Shireen jumps back, a hand pressed to her throat. She aims a light punch at Edric. “You scared me!”

“And that warrants a punching?” Edric asks, eyeing her still-raised fist.

“Sorry,” Shireen says quickly. She lets her hand fall. “I wasn’t expecting anyone.”

Edric shrugs, joining her in piling snow on top of her the mound. “Well, I haven’t seen you outside as much,” he says. “It’s kinda hard to crash into people that way.”

“Mhmm,” Shireen agrees. She has just decided that it should be a snowman, so she starts shaping the mound into a sphere.

“What are you doing that for?” Edric asks.

“Just because,” she replies, too focused on her task to give a full response.

There’s a beat of silence before Edric says, “Okay then. Hey, I gotta go. Maybe I’ll crash into you again?”

Shireen grins up at him, still a bit flushed from their chance meeting. “Yeah, I’d like that,” she says.

He runs off, joining up with a large group of boys who are all patting his back and hollering about something. Shireen smiles after him, thinking that she should definitely give him her number next time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please don't hate me.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I felt bad about leaving you with the other one, so now you get this one, too.
> 
> [Picset](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com/post/126476064916/study-buddies-chapter-7)

Rickon enjoys his time spent with Wylla more than he’d like to admit. Before he asked her out, he thought that there was nothing that could push Shireen from his mind. Now, he knew that he was horribly mistaken. Shireen was just a friend: someone to goof-off and joke around with. Wylla was everything she wasn’t: the most revealing outfits, even with the colder weather, hot lips and a tongue that he could get lost in, and a bouncing ball of energy wherever she went.

He had to admit that most of his distraction was because of Wylla’s insistence on getting him off as often as possible, even between classes and in the hallways. He wasn’t really into the public nature of their relationship, but she was so good about it that it was hard to fault her for caring about him. Rickon had tried to make it up to her, kissing her back and feeling her up in private, but she was never as willing to jump on him then.

Rickon’s just left Wylla after another make-out session in the halls, heading off to meet up with Shireen at the library for one of their last meetings for the semester. Soon, they would have no real reason to meet up, and he was banking on their friendship to keep them together after winter break. Shireen enters a few minutes after him, frowning slightly and giving him a strange look through her knitted brows.

“What’s up?” he asks, not used to seeing her looking concerned.

“Can we do this somewhere else today?” she asks. She changes her grip on her backpack, and Rickon can practically see the tension in her arms even though she’s wearing a heavy jacket.

“Yeah, sure,” Rickon says, picking up his things quickly. Shireen’s already walking away when he finishes, and he jogs a bit to catch up to her. She looks distracted, heading toward his room. Before she turns down the hallway, she shakes her head and leads them outside. Rickon wants to question her because it’s snowing, but he just follows her. They end up settled under a tree, leaning against the bark of it. Shireen sighs heavily, looking up at the branches. “Hey, what’s wrong?” he asks again, reaching out for her hand.

Shireen pulls away, making a fist and digging through her backpack for her gloves. Then, she holds her hands together and looks at him seriously. “I need to ask you two questions.”

Rickon is beyond confused, but Shireen looks so incredibly serious that he just says, “Okay.”

“First, do you trust me?” she asks sheepishly. Shireen bows her head to look up at him, twisting her hands in her lap.

Rickon nearly laughs. If there was anyone at this school that he trusted, it was Shireen. “Of course I do.”

“Okay.” Shireen takes a deep breath. Then, she faces Rickon squarely. “Have you ever slept with Wylla?”

“Um, no,” he says. Rickon can feel his face burning. “I never wanted to actually go that far yet…”

“Okay,” Shireen says again, brushing her hair away from her face. “But you trust me?”

“Yes,” Rickon says firmly, trying to look her in the eyes. “I already told you that.”

“I know,” Shireen says quickly. “It’s just… I feel so bad because I know I have to tell you, and I don’t really want to, but someone has to, and—”

“Shireen.” Rickon grabs onto one of her hands with a tight grip to stop her. He squeezes it gently. “Just tell me. I’ll believe you.”

Shireen sighs, meeting Rickon’s gaze. Her eyes look a little bit wet, and she bites her lip. Then, she closes her eyes tight and says, “She’s cheating on you.”

Rickon feels like he just got hit by a ton of bricks. He blinks at Shireen, watching her look up at his face with one eye still closed. Rickon scrunches up his face at her, looking around. “But…” he starts feebly. “How do you know?”

Shireen shakes her head. “I heard her bragging to one of her friends about it,” she mumbles. “With some guy named Rodrik… I mean, she could have been lying.”

Rickon clenches his fists, looking over to Shireen. “Hey, are you okay?” he asks.

Shireen nods. “I just didn’t want to ruin your first relationship,” she mumbles. “I’m sorry.”

Shaking his head at her, Rickon reaches over to pull her into a tight hug. “You’re not ruining it,” he says. “If anything, you’re saving me from it. Don’t feel bad. Want to go get some hot chocolate?” Nodding, Shireen starts to smile at him. Rickon grins back at her. “Excellent,” he said. “We can do some recon while we get some.”

He takes Shireen to the campus’s only restaurant, getting the both of them hot chocolate and discussing with her how it was possible that Wylla managed to cheat on him. She spent as much time with him as possible, always between classes and in the hallways. Shireen frowns on, letting him talk at her. Then, he breaths out a small “oh.” Shireen glances up at him, raising her eyebrows. “During study sessions,” Rickon says. “We almost always spend the day together after that… and I never go to her room…”

Shireen bites her lip. “I’m sorry, Rickon,” she mumbles.

“Don’t be,” Rickon tells her. “Now, we’ve just got to find this Rodrik and let him know that’s she’s being an asshole.”

Rickon takes Shireen back to her room before he goes off searching for Rodrik on his own. With only a little bit of asking around, he manages to locate the boy in question. Rickon decides to play it cool and bro it up. “Hey, man,” he says as casually as he can manage, leaning onto the wall next to Rodrik. Rodrik spares him a glance and nod, looking down at his phone. Rickon glances over to see text messages filled with emojis sent from a contact named Wylla. Biting back his comments, Rickon continues to play at casual. “So I heard you were dating Wylla.”

“Manderly,” Rodrik says, as if there are two Wyllas at this school. “She’s good one. Really enthusiastic, if you know what I mean.”

“Nice,” Rickon responds, suppressing a wince. “How long have you been dating?”

“Just two weeks,” Rodrik says. “But, man, she knows how to make it worth it.”

Rickon drops his façade, groaning and standing up straight. “Yeah, not really,” he says. Then, he holds out a hand to Rodrik. “I’m Rickon, and she’s also been dating me for two weeks.”

Rodrik gapes at him before slowly shaking his hand. “But she’s been fucking me,” he says.

“Probably because she wasn’t fucking me,” Rickon says bluntly. “Anyway, just wanted to make sure I knew the truth. See you later.” Rickon walks off, resisting the urges rushing through him to kick over every trashcan he comes across. Without bothering to save his rage, he pulls out his phone and texts Shireen.

_You were right. Heading over to dump her sorry cheating ass_

_Sorry_ is her reply. Quickly followed by a _Do you want me to be there for you?_

Rickon grins at his phone. _Only if you want to see the shitshow_.

 _Oh, my favorite_ , she says in response.

Rickon quickly texts a plan to Shireen before he calls Wylla. She answers immediately. “Hey, baby,” she purrs into the phone. Rickon tries not to think of how many people she greets like that. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Just thinking about you,” Rickon says, trying his best to feign interest. “About all those things you like to talk dirty about…”

“Mmmm,” Wylla responds. “You wanna give that a try?”

“I know a great place.” Rickon quickly tells her where to meet him, conveniently leaving out the fact that he had just asked Shireen to gather up as much of the student body there as possible. Then, he heads off, whistling to himself and sticking his hands in his pockets. He finds Wylla seated at an empty table in a fairly-crowded cafeteria. He’s surprised that she doesn’t find it odd, given the time of day and how many people aren’t eating. Still, Rickon slides into the seat next to her, placing an arm over her shoulders.

“Oh, hey, babe,” she says, smiling at him. Then, she puts a hand on his chest, slowly trailing her fingers over his chest. She winks at him slowly. “Are you ready for this?”

“Almost,” Rickon says. Then, he widens his eyes in mock surprise. He raises his voice. “Actually, no. I don’t want a cheating liar to keep making advances at me, and I certainly don’t want to be dating her. So our relationship status will be changing.”

Several people are looking on, laughing and grinning. Wylla’s jaw drops. She tries to cover it up by sitting up straighter. “Well, I don’t know who lied to you about me cheating, but I’ve been completely faithful to you.”

“It was your other boyfriend, actually,” Rickon says. Suddenly, he decides that he doesn’t need to make this any worse than it already is. He just wants people to know what she did and what kind of person she is. He scans the growing crowd, spotting Rodrik standing near the other end of the cafeteria. Rickon points a finger at him.

“We’re over now, too!” he calls. “Have fun fucking someone else!”

Wylla’s jaw stays down as she watches Rickon go over to fist-bump with Rodrik. Rickon goes back over to her briefly and says, “Maybe you should ask your next boyfriend if it’s okay first.”

Wylla aims a slap at him, and as furious as she seems it still doesn’t hurt as much as when Shireen hit him earlier in the year. The entire crowd gasps, and Rickon just shrugs. Then, she turns, her hair just hitting him in the face. Rickon scoffs, sitting down as the crowd applauds. A few people walk up to him, congratulating him on giving her up for his own morals. Rickon waits out the crowd feeling a little exhausted from the trials of today. Then, Shireen sits down next to him.

“You okay?” she asks.

“Yeah,” he says. He turns in his seat to face her, and she holds out a cup of jello at him. He laughs, taking the cup. “Thanks.”

“They didn’t have ice cream,” Shireen explains, eating into her own cup. “Ice cream would be more ideal for a break up.”

Rickon raises an eyebrow, looking up the ceiling. “I think that doesn’t apply when you do the breaking up,” he says. “But thanks. And at least I don’t have to buy her a Christmas present now.”

Shireen laughs, scooping into her own jello. She licks off the spoon completely before getting another bite. When they both finish, she follows him back to his room, leaving him alone for the rest of the day. Before she leaves, Rickon pulls her into a tight hug.

“Thank you,” he mumbles. “Although, I feel a little dirty now.”

“Then, go take a shower,” Shireen says, shoving him into the room. “I need to go get some stuff done. I’ll see you later.”

“Later,” Rickon repeats, feeling slightly dejected that Shireen is leaving him after the ordeal he’s been through today. Slumping on his bed, Rickon lets out a sigh. He feels like it had been building in his chest for the past few hours. Then, he goes to shower, staying under the water for a lot longer than usual.

He had really liked Wylla. Dating her had been fun, even if it was only for a couple weeks. A part of him felt like he was cheated of having a proper first relationship. He laughs, thinking that he was cheated in two ways and not just one. Then, he leans on the wall of the shower, letting the hot water hit him. After a longer time than he’s willing to admit, he leaves the shower and falls onto his bed. He looks through his drawer for a set of clothes, running across the Christmas presents he had already bought. He hadn’t told Shireen, but with school letting out for holiday in a few days, he had already done the Christmas shopping. Wylla’s present is wrapped nicely with a massive bow on it. It’s just a bracelet, but Rickon feels terrible just looking at the box. He rips off the bow and throws it into his trashcan. Briefly, he considers just giving it to one of his sisters instead, but the idea feels so wrong that he resolves to take it back to the store later. 

The other box, he’s keeping until the day before break. It’s a joke gift for Shireen; something he hopes she’ll remember and like anyways. He smiles to himself, remembering that he still has a friend even though he no longer has a girlfriend. Pulling out his phone, he texts her again.

_Where are you?_

The reply comes faster than he expected. _Library, why?_

Without responding, Rickon dons his jacket and boots before walking over to the library. He finds Shireen at their usual table, but she’s just reading a book for fun. She glances up when he sits across from her. Then, she puts down her book. “Are you okay?” she asks.

Rickon nods before shaking his head. He doesn’t know what’s wrong with him, but everything just _hurts_ and he doesn’t want to deal with it. He lets out a heavy sigh. “I just don’t want to be alone,” he mumbles. Then, he slumps down, placing his head in his arms to cover the sting of his tears.

Shireen reaches out, running a hand through Rickon’s hair. She hates that she has to see him like this, hates that she is partially the cause of it. He’s so young, too young to be hurt so much by someone he cared about. She lets him hide, waits for him to compose himself enough to sit up again. Then, she gives him a weak smile. She can’t relate: her last boyfriend had just dumped her, no cheating involved. Still, she can imagine the pain that he must be going through. “Do you want to get some real ice cream?”

Rickon looks several years older when he nods, and even though he’s looking directly into her eyes, he doesn’t seem to be looking at her at all. It breaks Shireen’s heart. She reaches out for him, letting him choose whether to take her hand or not. He does, briefly, only just squeezing it before putting his hand in his pocket. His mouth flickers in the smallest hint of a smile before it fades completely, and he looks hollow. Shireen sighs, leading him outside. There’s an ice cream shop just a few miles from Skagos, but Shireen’s willing to walk the distance in the snow if it’ll help Rickon feel better.

They don’t make it that far. They’re barely make it outside before Rickon just sits in the snow. Shireen turns to watch him and waits to see if he’ll continue to follow her. He doesn’t. Shireen lets out a sigh, watching him bury his hands in the snow. She almost lets him continue when she realizes that he isn’t dressed properly for being outside. Sitting next to him, Shireen pulls his hands out of the snow, warming them up in hers. Rickon looks up at her, still not looking quite _at_ her, before he lets out a shaky breath.

“Why does everything suck so much?” he asks. Taking a deep breath, he goes on, talking as if it’ll help relieve the weight from his shoulders. “If she was the one being an asshole, then why do I feel like crap? Why does it hurt?”

Shireen pulls him closer, and Rickon falls onto her lap. She pushes her hand through his hair again. “I don’t know, sweetie,” she says. “Sometimes life is just awful.”

Rickon’s quiet for a while, his breathing steadying slightly. “I might have loved her,” he mumbles. “And she didn’t care about me at all.”

“You don’t know that,” Shireen tries weakly.

Rickon silences her with a glare. “You don’t do this to someone you love,” he says firmly. “If you love someone, this is the last thing you want them to feel.”

“I’m sorry, Rickon,” Shireen mumbles yet again, wondering how long she’s going to have to watch her best friend deal with his broken heart.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> [Picset](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com/post/126612088576/study-buddies-chapter-8)

Rickon takes longer to recover than Shireen expects. She watches him at a distance, letting him find his own comfort now that he has more things to sort through. He seems to be halfheartedly trying to act normal, but he doesn’t look at her the same way anymore and he trails off a lot more while he’s talking. Shireen stays with him as much as possible, and while he doesn’t talk as much anymore, it doesn’t seem like he’s ignoring her either.

They watch movies more than anything during the last few days of school before break, lying on his bed together and mostly keeping quiet. Rickon doesn’t chatter through them like he used to. He just watches on, though when Shireen looks over to him, she notices that he isn’t even watching them half the time. She doesn’t mention it. Occasionally, Rickon will begin to talk incessantly, trailing off halfway through a thought.

It isn’t until the day before break that she decides they need to do something else. She jumps onto his bed, carrying a box. Rickon had been laying on it, as well, but he just looks over to her. When he smiles, she notices that it starts to reach his eyes. Shireen squirms about until she’s sitting cross-legged next to him.

“So it’s the last day before we depart forever,” Shireen says, drumming her fingers over the box.

Rickon raises an eyebrow at her. “Excuse me?”

Shireen rolls her eyes, looking exasperated and letting out a small huff. “Well, next semester, we won’t have to be study partners,” she says. “And I’ve been trying to get rid of you since day one. Really, you should have expected this.”

Shoving her shoulder lightly, Rickon sits up. “Yeah, okay,” he says. Then, he opens up his drawer and pulls out her present. “I still got you a present, loser.”

Grinning, Shireen takes the box before shoving her own at him. “Me, too,” she says, laughing. “But you should probably open your present first.”

Shaking his head slightly, Rickon rips off the wrapping paper. Shireen watches him, a small smile growing on her face. She slowly edges off the bed, reaching into her backpack. After managing the wrapping paper, Rickon opens the box. Carefully, he moves through the tissue paper and pulls out a can of silly string.

“Silly—HEY!”

Shireen had just squirted him with her own can. Turning to her, Rickon starts to take the top off his own when Shireen aims another shot at him. “Tag!” she calls, moving to the door. “You’re it!”

Running through the halls, Shireen hears the faint sounds of Rickon following after her. Shireen weaves through the mess of students who are preparing to leave for break, and the halls are more crowded than usual because everyone is required to leave for winter break. Still, Rickon catches up to her and sprays her with the purple string. Then, he turns on his heel and runs.

Chasing after him, Shireen realizes the flaw in her plan: Rickon’s legs are much longer than hers and he definitely has the advantage here. Still, she manages to cut him off around a corner and get him back. Rickon’s now covered in pink string, and Shireen resists the urge to take a picture of him before running off. She begins moving through the halls again, hopping over bags and boxes to distance herself from Rickon. Rounding a corner quickly, she crashes into a fairly solid mass.

“Oops, sorry!” she says quickly, trying to back away. Whoever she crashed into has a fairly solid grip on her shoulders, though. Shireen looks up, ready to tell off whomever it is, when she sees a familiar face. She bites back a sharp comment and simply says, “Dad.”

“Would you like to explain the state you’re in?” he asks. His eyes are as cold and cruel as ever, looking just past her.

Shireen shoves off his grip. Crossing her arms, Shireen forces her father to meet her gaze. “I’m already packed,” she says firmly. “And you said you wouldn’t be here for a few hours.”

“Well, your mother’s in the car waiting,” he says. He grabs her forearm and starts pulling her toward her room. “We’re leaving now. Go get your things.”

Wincing slightly, Shireen pries off his fingers. “Just give me a minute to say goodbye to my friend,” she tells him.

Her father rounds on her. Shireen remembers how renowned Stannis Baratheon is for his ruthlessness in getting whatever he wants. She swallows hard as he nearly spits out, “I have no time for your shenanigans. We are on a schedule.”

“And if you could leave me here, you would,” Shireen shoots back, raising her voice. “I get it. But fuck off while I say my goodbyes.” She turns on her heel, heading back to Rickon’s room. From behind her, she can hear her father muttering about how useless she is. Grinding her teeth, Shireen is so focused on walking she doesn’t notice anyone until a familiar voice comes from her shoulder.

“So your dad seems fun.”

She turns to see Rickon, looking murderous. His arms are crossed and the grip on his can of silly string is so tight that his knuckles are turning white. She’s surprised that anyone can look so deadly while covered in pink silly string, but he does, and Shireen can’t help but think about over-protective dogs. Breathing out a heavy sigh, Shireen follows him into his room. “Yeah, he’s a blast,” she deadpans. “It’s real fun back home: keeping me secluded from everything so no one realizes that he actually has a daughter, or that I’m so ugly.”

“Asshole,” Rickon mutters. He picks up her present and hands it over to her. Swallowing hard, he briefly thinks that now isn’t the best time to give her the present, especially since it was meant to be a joke. His heart is pounding in his ears from seeing her father’s blatant attempt at controlling Shireen, and he seriously wants to punch some sense into him.

Shireen breathes out a large breath of air, working the wrapping paper off with only slightly more finesse than he did. Rickon watches her intently, suddenly realizing that this is probably the most inappropriate gift he could give her. He tightens his hands into fists, holding back the urge to take it back. Shireen is already opening the box, though, so he just sucks in a breath.

She lets out a particularly loud snort. Then, she starts laughing outright. Slowly, she picks up the vibrator from the box, holding it up to show him. “Please, _please,_ tell me that you actually walked into a store and bought this.”

“All for the sake of a joke,” Rickon says. He lets the grin sit on his face. “The woman at the store highly recommended it, though.”

Shireen laughs, opening the packaging and testing the vibrator a few times to see if it actually works. She wipes a tear from her eye. Rickon grins, ecstatic that she found it just as funny as he did. After a minute, Shireen places it into her backpack, shoving the box and wrapping paper back at Rickon. “My dad wouldn’t be very happy knowing that I was getting gifts like this,” she says slowly. “But, gods, is it funny…”

“Want me to walk you back?” Rickon offers. He recalls the small image he got of her father, a tall, calculating man with no care for his daughter. Rickon feels like he needs to stay near Shireen to keep her as safe as possible. 

Shireen shakes her head. “No need to anger the politician,” she says, waving off the matter. “He might lock me up in a tower or some shit like that.”

“Alright,” Rickon says, rolling his eyes a bit. He stands up, crossing the room to stand next to her. Then, he holds out his arms sheepishly. Ever since Wylla, he simply hasn’t thought of Shireen the same way and hugging her seems weirdly intimate now. His crush on Shireen had faded down to almost nothing, but now he just feels empty most of the time. He even has a hard time looking at her the same way. He looks directly into her eyes now, trying to find the familiar spark she left in his stomach before.

Shireen steps forward into his arms, squeezing him tight around the middle. Slowly, he wraps his arms around her, wondering what happened to him—what could have caused him to no longer be affected by her touches. She pulls away slowly, blinking up at him. Then, she leans up onto her tiptoes and kisses his cheek. Immediately, Rickon remembers Wylla. But Shireen’s kiss is soft and tentative, where Wylla had always been dominating and slightly overbearing.

“I’ll see you after break,” she says, drawing away. “But you can still text me if anything pops up.”

“Okay,” Rickon says, waiting until the door has closed behind her to reach up for his cheek. The skin there is burning, and he can still feel the ghost of her lips there. His breath hitches, and he sits down, tracing his fingers over his face. Shireen isn’t Wylla. She will never be Wylla, and she never was. Rickon knows he can’t compare them. They simply aren’t comparable. Pushing Wylla from his mind, Rickon just thinks about Shireen.

Shireen is still here for him. Shireen still cares about him. And he still cares about her. Falling back to his bed, a feeling of relief washes over him. He spent enough time thinking that he lost some part of him with Wylla. He needs to forget her. He wants to move on. So he does. Rickon decides that he’s done with it: all the memories and all the actions. Of course, it isn’t enough to just want it to happen, so Rickon spends his time while packing reasoning it out to himself. By the time Sansa stops by to pick him up, Rickon is fairly okay with everything that happened. Yes, it happened. Yes, it was significant. But he isn’t going to let it eat him up.

He leaves his room after the message from Sansa comes. Carrying a few of his bags, he heads out. On the way, he catches sight of Wylla openly making out with someone else in the hallway. He can actually see her tongue pressing into her new boyfriend’s mouth. Rickon is pleasantly surprised when a laugh escapes him because he doesn’t want her – not in the slightest. Whatever they had before is completely crushed now, and Rickon couldn’t be happier about it.

With a huge grin on his face, he gets in the back of Sansa’s car. He’s so distracted by the euphoria running through his system that he doesn’t notice the man sitting in the passenger seat until he’s looking out the window. He turns, giving the man a hard look. This guy is _huge_ taking up most of the space to the ceiling in Sansa’s relatively small sedan. Rickon turns to Sansa, looking for an explanation.

Sansa nearly laughs at him, seeing the confusion on his face. “Confused, little brother?” she asks with a huge smile on her face.

“Um, who’s he?” Rickon asks.

“This is my good friend Sandor,” Sansa says. Her hand disappears somewhere behind the seat in front of him.

Rickon ignores the strange feeling in his stomach. Sansa is plenty old enough to be dating whoever she wants, and he isn’t going to stop her. Rickon says, “Hey.”

The man grunts, raising a hand in some semblance of a wave. Then, Sansa starts driving off, glancing over to Rickon occasionally. “So what’s eating at you?” she asks. “You looked plenty happy about something earlier. Finally got the girl?”

Rickon sputters out a laugh. “The opposite, actually,” he corrects. He briefly tells Sansa about his fleeting relationship with Wylla, knowing that of all his siblings Sansa was likely to be the most sympathetic. She responds exactly as he thought she would. Sansa’s perceptive, and Rickon knows that she’s not going to give him the same tip-toeing treatment that Shireen did. He doesn’t need it anymore. Still, he’s glad to have told someone else about it. He finally finishes with, “I’m doing good now.”

“Good,” Sansa says firmly. “Who needs that baggage with Christmas coming?”

“Not me,” Rickon says. His phone buzzes with an incoming text from Shireen. Glancing down at it, he swipes at the screen to read her two words.

_Save me._

Rickon smiles at the phone, typing out, _Just as horrible as you thought?_

_Worse. Parents are getting divorced and decide to tell me on the drive home. Now, they won’t stop arguing._

_I’m sure I can get my parents to fly you out if you want._

_That might actually get me in more trouble. I’m not supposed to exist, remember?_

_Your shit father?_

_That’s putting it lightly._

Rickon shakes his head, wondering how anyone could willingly hide their kid for eighteen years. Shireen is nearly an adult with enough fury in her to tear anyone apart who messes with her now. Rickon sighs before typing out: _I’m here if you need me._

A full hour passes before he gets another message from Shireen. _Could I call you when I have time?_

_Sure._

Rickon leans back, finally looking out. They’re nearly to Winterfell, and he estimates another thirty minutes of driving to get home. He looks back over to his sister, seeing a small smile on her face. Occasionally, she glances over at Sandor. Finally, Rickon just asks, “So how long have you two been dating?”

He feels the car jerk slightly as Sansa’s face turns redder than her hair. He looks over to see Sandor ducking down slightly. Sansa turns to aim a sharp glare at him before her resolve breaks. “About a month,” she mumbles.

“And you didn’t bring him to Thanksgiving?” Rickon asks. He pretends to look offended. “Mom’s going to be pissed.”

Sansa frowns, looking over to Sandor. When he speaks, Rickon hears a voice that’s much deeper and gruffer than he imagined. “I was working,” he says. “Little Bird asked me to take Christmas off.”

Sansa blushes and says “Sandor!” at the same time Rickon says, “Little Bird?”

With a glare from his sister, Rickon sits quietly for the rest of the ride. He distracts himself by digging through his backpack and finding the can of silly string. He had put it back in the box it came in. Rickon notices a small scrap of paper between the tissue paper. Picking it up, he finds that it is the receipt for two cans of silly string, a box, and tissue paper. He holds back a laugh, thinking that Shireen was organized in everything but buying gifts. Just as he’s about to crumple up the receipt, he sees writing on the back of it.

_Yeah, I was too lazy to buy a card. Sue me. You needed some more fun, loser. Stop moping around over Christmas. Your life isn’t over, and I’ll miss you if you disappear. Ew, that was cheesy. Good thing I didn’t waste it on a card. Merry Christmas! or whatever…_

The “or whatever” was scribbled in tiny lettering on the edge of the receipt. Rickon figures that Shireen just ran out of space and forgot that some people don’t celebrate Christmas. Still, he folds up the receipt, tucking it into his wallet. He really should buy her a better present, or at least a more serious one. Even though they were thrown together because of a stupid school assignment, he really enjoyed becoming friends with her. He knew it started mostly because he had a massive crush on her, but he is now fully prepared to just enjoy her friendship.

Sansa takes them all the way up the drive of their house and is fully parked when his phone rings. He silently curses Shireen’s timing before remembering that she was on the road hours before he was. He answers the call and tries to pick up his bags one-handed. “What’s up?”

“Have you ever read _Harry Potter_?”

Rickon rolls his eyes. Really, he should expect nothing less from her. “Do you think I just ignored that phenomenon or something?” he asks back, struggling to pull a bag over his shoulder.

“You just don’t really seem like someone who reads a lot,” Shireen says. He can practically hear the smile in her voice. He imagines her eyes going bright as she teases him. Still, he doesn’t feel the same draw to her and that alone feels weird.

“Yeah, you’re right,” Rickon says. He tries to manage his last two bags before Sandor takes one from him. “I never got through the last one.”

Shireen’s gasp comes from the line. “I am personally offended,” she says sharply. “Can I make your homework be to finish the book?”

“Why would you do that?” Rickon asks, starting up the stairs to the front door. “You know I don’t finish my homework.”

He hears her laugh ringing through the phone. She finally settles down and stays quiet for a while. “Are you going somewhere?” she asks.

“Just got home,” Rickon says shortly, his breath coming in short bursts. “Gotta put myself inside and stuff.”

“Whoops,” Shireen says. “And here I am, making your life difficult. Call me when you have time. And tell your family hi for me.”

“I am not going to be the middle man for a conversation between you and my family,” Rickon says, finally on the top step. He stops just outside the door.

“Oh, you know what I mean,” Shireen says. “Call me back.”

She hangs up and Rickon shoves his phone back into his pocket before entering. He’s beyond surprised when his mother pulls him into a hug. “Hi, Mom,” he says.

Catelyn takes a bag from him, heading to his room to put it down. “All semester and no incidents,” she says. “Oh, you actually _do_ want to come home.”

Rickon bites back a smile. He remembered his history of getting suspended from school a lot. It was the reason why he was sent off to Skagos in the first place. Before he left, his parents had told him that if he went a whole year with no incidents and good grades, he could come back for school in Winterfell the next year. Truth was, Rickon hadn’t even been thinking about it. He had just been distracted by Shireen and Wylla this past semester. However, Rickon now has other motives to come back home next year, so he just sighs and says, “Yeah, Mom.”

Catelyn is beyond delighted as she leaves his room, and Rickon drops his bags before pulling out his laptop. As he expects, Shireen is already signed into Skype. He calls her, digging out his headphones in the process. He plugs them in right when she answers.

“So you read Chamber of Secrets?” she asks immediately. Then, she tacks on, “the second one?”

Rickon takes the time to look at her room in the frame behind her. He’s surprised to find that there are no decorations, and all her things are in boxes. The only things he can see are the edges of a bedspread that looks far too serious for her and some things that look like they’ve only just been pulled out of her bags. “Yes, I read the second one,” he says. “Giant snake and shit.”

“Right,” Shireen says. She sits back on the bed, and she runs her hands through her hair. It looks messier than usual. “So at home, I’m basically like Harry Potter at the Dursleys. I have to stay in my room—which is the “guest room”—I can’t make too much noise, and I can’t let the neighbors see me. And if they do, my dad pretends I’m some charity case he’s helping out or something.”

She finished ticking off the points on her fingers, slumping down a bit. Rickon frowns, twisting his mouth a bit. “Wait, are you positive that they’re your actual parents?”

“Unfortunately, yes,” Shireen says. “They kept going on about how I’ve ruined their lives because they had to stay together until I turned eighteen. Something about not wanting to deal with custody…”

“Hold on.” Rickon holds up a hand, trying to think through this. “ _That’s_ why you’re at Skagos?”

Shireen nods, a sarcastic smile on her face. “Oh yeah,” she says. “Much easier to pretend I don’t exist if they ship me off to boarding schools and camps at every opportunity. Plus, my dad will pay them a shit ton of cash to keep them quiet.”

“Fuck, Shireen,” Rickon says slowly, rubbing a hand over his face. “That’s all kinds of messed up. Gods, I should’ve asked for you to come with us for this break, too.”

Glancing upwards, Shireen shakes her head progressively getting faster as she continues. “No, that would have been awful,” she states. “If my dad finds out that someone else knows about it—shit, it he finds out that Eddard fucking Stark knows about it, you’ll probably have to dig me out of a ditch.”

“How about we don’t talk about my dad like that?” Rickon asks. He really doesn’t enjoy his father’s moderate level of fame from being the CEO of the biggest company in the country, and he ignores it as much as possible.

“Fine,” Shireen agrees. “But I’m still invisible here.”

“What are your plans for break?” Rickon asks, purely out of curiosity now. He doesn’t understand how she’s lived most of her life doing nothing.

Shireen holds up a copy of _Harry Potter_. “Same thing I do every year,” she says. “Try to take over the world.”

“And pray that Ron Weasley flies his dad’s car to your window?” Rickon jests.

“You know, if he went for Hermione, I don’t think he’d mind me,” Shireen says.

Rickon scoffs loudly. “Um, Emma Watson is super hot.”

“And Hermione is a dork with uncontrollable hair,” Shireen adds on. “I abide by book canon!”

Shaking his head at her, Rickon pulls out an earbud, hearing the distant calls of his mother. He scrunches up his face. “Mom calls,” he tells her. “I gotta go.”

Shireen lets out a heavy sigh, waving a hand weakly. “I’ll see you in three weeks, then,” she mumbles.

Rickon raises an eyebrow at her. “It’s going to take you three weeks to finish _Harry Potter_?”

“No…” Shireen says slowly.

“Then, I’ll come back online,” he says. “I can pretend I’m actually doing my homework.”

“Or you could read _Harry Potter_ …”

“Nah, you’d miss me too much.” He sticks out his tongue at her, sliding the note out of his wallet and waving it in the webcam. Shireen just shakes her head, returning the gesture, and Rickon notices that her tongue is distinctly blue. 

 

Then, she ends the call, slumping down onto the bed. Really, it was hers. Sure, it was the guest room, but her parents never had guests over when she was home. Sighing, Shireen cracks open the first book of many that will keep her company over the break.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You're mostly getting this chapter because I needed a distraction.
> 
> Let me know what you think!


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Picset](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com/post/126727674831/study-buddies-chapter-9)

Shireen has spent the last week reading on the beach. She is lucky enough to be close to an ocean. As long as she wakes up early enough, she can escape to the beach all day as long as she doesn’t let anyone see her on her way back to the house. By now, she has a routine down: wake up early, pack an extra set of clothes, grab a towel and umbrella, and take off to the sand for the entire day. Usually, she was fine with this set up, spending her time in the sun and getting a nice tan even though it was still snowing in other places. All in all, she would rather be in the snow. Still, she has to give the beach some credit.

Today, however, is an off day. Rickon had texted her last night, asking for a Skype date later, so she is dutifully locked up in her room, awaiting his call. Already, she has read through a majority of her collected books, and unless she asks her parents to buy more she is stuck re-reading them. Scrolling through the internet, Shireen clicks over to the next page when a Skype call pops up.

Rickon is staring back at her, rubbing his eyes. Shireen can see the flecks of snow in his hair, and she instantly becomes jealous. He makes a face. “So I’m up in the fucking cold North, freezing my ass off, and you actually manage to get a tan?” he asks by way of greeting. “If I didn’t hate the sun so much, I might actually be jealous.”

“Is that why you refuse to leave your room?” she asks, thinking about how anti-social he is at Skagos. Really, he should get out more, but she probably isn’t the best one to be giving that advice. Shireen leans against a wall, taking her laptop with her and only caring a tiny bit about being in the frame.

“Well, the last time I left, I may have gotten a girlfriend, but I’m going to go ahead and say that it wasn’t worth it,” he muses, scrunching up his face.

“You really didn’t enjoy all those blowjobs?” Shireen asks, wondering if she can get a rise out of him. He really does seem to be completely over his ex, and she’s hoping that he’s willing to joke about it now.

Rickon just rolls his eyes at her. “I didn’t fuck her,” he says. “I thought you’d believe me on that one.”

Shaking her head slightly, Shireen just sets a look at him. “So to what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Not much of a pleasure,” Rickon admits, twisting his mouth. “My dad’s been asking questions… about you.”

Shireen sits up, leaning over slightly. “Do _not_ let him go digging,” she says. “At least wait until my birthday. Seriously. I’ll move out immediately after that, and he can do whatever he wants, but if a story busts _now_ , I probably won’t even get to college.”

“Fine, fine,” Rickon agrees, waving off the matter. “I’ll deal with my dad… But how did you even apply? What name did you put on your applications?”

“Mine,” Shireen says firmly. “And all my essays were about my terrible life as an unloved, ugly child. It’s pretty good shit. I’m hoping _someone_ will let me in.”

They talk casually for another hour or so. A few times the conversation lapses into silence as they search the internet and send each other funny pictures. Shireen is lying across her bed now, nearly entirely out of frame as she scrolls through the internet. Rickon is still laughing at a picture of a cat she sent him when she mumbles out, “Hey, Ric?”

He hums out a response, only just glancing up at the screen. Then, his brows furrow and he sits up. “Ric?” he questions.

Shireen shrugs awkwardly, only just sitting up on her elbows. “I dunno,” she says. “It kinda sounds cute.”

“Okay, _Shir_ ,” he shoots back. “What is it?”

Smiling, Shireen thinks through the nickname. She always thought that her name was too weird to be shortened. All the possibilities she thought of as a child just sounded ridiculous. Somehow, though, Rickon managed to find a way to say it that made her heart skip.

“Shir?” Rickon says, waving a hand in front of the camera. “Earth to Shireen! Internet to Shir!”

“Sorry,” she says quickly. “I was just thinking that I needed to thank you…. I’ve never had anyone to talk to over break before.”

Rickon presses his mouth shut tight, giving her a look that’s increasing in weirdness the longer it lasts. His eyes are wide when he finally says, “Starting to sound kinda desperate there.”

“Shut up, asshole,” Shireen replies, hitting the screen of her laptop with a pillow. “I was trying to be nice!”

“So you call me an asshole?” Rickon questions. A genuine smile is on his face now, and Shireen can’t help but smile back. The joy in his demeanor is infectious. “That’s not a nice thing to do, jerk.”

“Bitch.”

“Dork.”

“Loser.”

“Nerd.”

Shireen isn’t sure when spewing insults at each other became their thing, but she’s rolling around her bed, trying to think of more when the door to her bedroom opens. She swipes at her laptop, trying to close it and pulls out her headphones. “Hey, Mom,” she says slowly. “What’s up?”

“I was thinking we could go somewhere,” she replies. Shireen had never been particularly fond of her mother, and she was surprised that her mother even came in to talk to her. “We could go have some mother-daughter time together. What do you say?”

“Mom, it’s still early,” Shireen says, glancing outside and seeing the light of the day still shining through her window. “Won’t Dad be…?”

“Oh, forget him,” her mother says, waving a hand flippantly. She brushes her hair over her shoulder. “Let’s go do something.”

Shireen narrows her eyes at her mother, scooting just slightly away. “No, thanks,” she says. “I’m reading something. Maybe later?”

Her mother huffs, and Shireen remembers how Selyse Baratheon once had a reputation for being ruthless and coldhearted until she married her father and became publicly known as a barren woman. Slowly, she leaves the room, slamming the door behind her. Shireen sighs loudly, slumping down on her bed. With a loud groan and some mumbling, she opens her laptop again.

Rickon had been waiting patiently on the other line. The volume on his computer was turned all the way up so he could eavesdrop on the conversation with her mother. He’s a little bit peeved about the sudden attention that she’s getting, especially since she had just called _him_ special and his heart is still pounding from hearing her use a nickname for him. Rickon is also positive that her mother has ulterior motives for talking to her. Not wanting to draw attention to it, he bites his tongue from making a comment and just asks, “So what are you reading?”

Shireen bites her lip, looking up at him shyly through her eyelashes. A full moment passes when she finally mumbles out, “ _Harry Potter_ fanfiction…”

It is only because he forgot to turn the volume down that he heard her tiny mumble. The snort that escapes him is quickly swallowed up by his laughter. “Nerd,” he repeats, a huge grin on his face.

\--

Winter break passes rather uneventfully for Rickon. He has a few conversations with Bran where he tells him about Wylla and how she ruined everything he was feeling about Shireen before. But when he slips up and says “Shir,” Bran refuses to let it go, forcing him to talk through his feelings just as if he was in his crap therapy class. Although Rickon tries to run from the conversation, Bran continues to find him over and over again, pressing the matter even further. Eventually, Rickon succumbs to the pressure, admitting that maybe, _maybe_ he might still like her.

It is with new mixed feelings that Rickon returns to school. He tries to focus on having Shireen as a friend now, despite how much his brother tried to convince him that he is in love with her. Rickon shakes the thought from his head, trying to force himself to gag on it. However, he can’t seem to find it repulsive, and he’s actually smiling when he dumps his bags in his room. Rickon falls onto his bed, thinking it through. Rolling over, he finds that he can still smell Shireen, despite how long it’s been and he’s eager to go see her again.

Digging through his bag, he pulls out the present he bought for her: an actual present this time. Opening the door, Rickon nearly bolts out when he finds Shireen standing there, looking shocked with her fist raised to knock. She hesitates, and they both stand there, looking at each other with strange looks. When Rickon is sure that she’s not moving anytime soon, he reaches down for her hand and pulls her into the room. Shireen automatically goes to sit down on the bed and he spots a small box in her hands.

“So you’re not getting rid of me?” he asks, taking a seat next to her.

Finally, the spell over Shireen breaks, and she laughs. “Please,” she says, flipping her hair over her shoulder. “You’d be lost without me.”

“Yeah, sure.” Rickon places the box on her lap. “I got you a real present, and I swear it’s not a vibrator this time.”

Shireen gives him a dramatic frown. “But I really liked that,” she says. “I had a lot of fun over break with it.”

She gives him a careful wink, and even though Rickon knows she’s joking, he can’t stop the images filling his mind. He’s short of breath and trying his best to hide it, biting his tongue hard to stop his body from reacting to the thought. Luckily, Shireen isn’t paying any attention to him. Her hands are busy unwrapping the box. She stops when she sees a nice jewelry box.

“Oh, I can’t take this,” she mumbles. Slowly, she hands it back to him.

“You don’t even know what it is,” Rickon says. He’s honestly a little sad that Shireen was so eager to reject a gift from him, especially since he spent a lot of thought on it. So he tells a small lie. “I just reused the box.”

Biting her lip, Shireen slowly opens the box. Rickon had been planning on gauging her reaction, but seeing her teeth tugging at her lip sends a sharp flare of heat through his body. He can’t keep lying to himself now. He really wants to kiss her. He wants to hold her close and put his own teeth on her lips, dragging his hands over her scars and feeling every inch of her. He wants to know her better than anyone, and his heart is pounding at the thought. Rickon didn’t think that just being near her would trigger this reaction again, but he’s doing everything to distract himself from her at this point.

Shireen lets out a small gasp that pulls Rickon from his thoughts, finally looking at her entirely. Her thumb is a light brush over the pendant. Rickon can’t see it, but he remembers it. It’s a plain silver chain with a pendant in the shape of a direwolf: the mascot of Winterfell University. With a deep breath, Shireen shuts the box. “Okay,” she says firmly, meeting his gaze. “I really can’t take this.”

“Why not?” Rickon asks. “Don’t think you’re going to get in?”

“It’s just… it’s too…” Shireen trails off, cracking open the box again to hold the necklace in her hand. She’s smiling down at it, and her feet bounce lightly against the edge of his bed. Then, she looks straight at him. “Will you help me put it on?”

Rickon carefully takes the necklace from her, letting the chain hang from his palm. Shireen stares at the silver of it, watching it glimmer as it swings back and forth. She can’t seem to stop looking at it, can’t fathom how anyone would give her a gift of this magnitude. Quickly, she turns her back to him, drawing her hair over one shoulder so he can see what he’s doing. Rickon’s arm rests on her shoulder, and Shireen steadies herself, letting him manage the task. He fumbles with the chain, and Shireen can hear the small clink of the pendant hitting the chain. Then, Rickon leans over her other shoulder, his chest pressed to her back. Shireen hitches in a breath, thinking for one wild moment that he’s trying to kiss her. However, he’s staring down at the necklace, checking to make sure it’s facing the right direction. Then, the weight on her back disappears and the necklace falls over her shoulders.

Shireen reaches up for the pendant, rolling it between her fingers and admiring the small direwolf that now hangs about her neck. She doesn’t even realize that she’s left her hair trapped under the chain until Rickon pulls it free. His fingers lightly brush her neck in the process, and Shireen has a hard time ignoring the sensation. 

She looks back at Rickon, giving him a weak smile. He isn’t looking at her face, though. His eyes have dropped and he’s staring at the pendant. She lets it drop, but his gaze just follows it. Now, he’s staring unabashedly at her breasts, and she clears her throat loudly. Rickon looks up, a flush covering his face.

“Sorry,” he says quickly. “I’m just glad that you like it… It looks nice on you.”

Biting back a comment, Shireen just hands him the box she was carrying. Rickon takes it sheepishly, the blush still clear on his face. _Maybe he_ was _trying to kiss her…_ Shireen shakes the thought from her head, reminding herself that they’re just friends, and friends get each other presents and hang out in their spare time. 

When she looks back to Rickon, he’s got the glass jar in his hands, twisting it about to see the many shells she fit inside of it. During her break, she often walked the beach, collecting them. Rickon twists off the top of the jar and holds it up to his nose, breathing in the scent. “I’m going to guess that the ocean smells like salt?”

Shireen shoves his shoulder lightly. “I figured that that would be the closest you ever got to the sea,” she replies. “Probably the most sun you’ll ever get in your life.”

Rickon shakes his head, screwing the lid back onto the jar. His lips are moving soundlessly, and Shireen is tempted to ask, but she doesn’t think she’s ready to hear whatever it is. She can feel her heart hammering against her chest, trying not to link the different kinds of intimacy they just shared with each other. Quickly, she stands up.

“Well, I should finish unpacking,” she says. She spins slowly in place, pretending to look around for anything she brought. “Maybe I can find a teacher and figure out what my extra class is going to be this semester. I’ll see you around, Rickon.”

As soon as the door closes behind her, Shireen feels like ripping the necklace off. It’s too personal. It means too much. She can’t possibly let it continue to sit over her heart. She can’t let _Rickon_ claim that spot. It wasn’t his. He’s too young, too out of reach, and she had other things to worry about. Fiddling with the chain, Shireen lets out a heavy sigh. She carefully places the necklace back down and hurries off to her room.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Picset](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com/post/127002292311/study-buddies-chapter-10)

A month of school passes just as it had last semester. The only discernible difference is that instead of hanging out with Shireen for class, he’s slogged into some weird art therapy class. It’s pretty useless, as far as he’s concerned; and if it wasn’t for Shireen’s “Let Us Prep You For College” Class, he’d wish she was there with him. Knowing her, though, she’d just be drawing dicks on everything and their counselor would be trying to interpret it as anything but sexual. Rickon snorts at the thought, choking on his breath and coughing a bit. People around him stop to stare at him, but he ignores it, trying to casually wipe his face. He can feel the squish of thick goo smearing onto his cheek.

“Fuck,” he says, belatedly remembering the paint that was covering his hands. He feebly attempts to wipe off his hands on a paper towel before cleaning his face. The class passes uneventfully, as it always does, and he leaves slowly, heading back to his room. On the way, Shireen bumps into him lightly.

“So did they forget to give you a canvas, or were going for a more personal piece?” she asks, waving her hands around.

“Ha ha,” Rickon deadpans. He swipes at his face again, and he can feel the residue cracking and spreading further around. Shireen just laughs at him, shaking her head and turning to face him directly.

“Come here,” she says, licking her thumb. Rickon swallows hard, but nothing could prepare him for the warm sensation of her hands holding him still and cleaning him up. He tries to make faces at her, hoping to distract himself as much as possible. It works some, but he can still feel his stomach fluttering. Shireen steps back and assesses him. “All better.”

Rickon sighs, rolling his eyes some. “I’m sure I look much better now,” he says sarcastically. “How’s your weird class going? I heard you have some nice eye candy in there.”

Shireen shoves him hard into the wall. “Would you _not_?” she asks sharply. Glancing around, she starts walking again, but Rickon catches up quickly. Shireen tries to keep her gaze away from Rickon. He’s been smiling a lot more now, and Shireen would be lying if she said she didn’t find his smile attractive.

Keeping pace with her, Rickon doesn’t say anything else until they get to his room. Shireen automatically starts doing her homework, taking over his bed and reading through something. Rickon goes through the motions of doing his work, but something about her just seems _off_ —almost too forced. When she starts biting her pencil, he just says, “Spill.”

Shireen sits up immediately, looking him straight in the eyes. “Okay, so everyone in my class has been talking about throwing some big party,” she says quickly. Rickon can tell that this information has been eating at her, and she’s been dying to tell him. “And I don’t really care how much you want to tease me about it, but I really want to ask Edric to go with me because then I’d definitely be going, and I’d get to go with _him_ , you know? But I don’t think I can actually ask him, so could you pretty please maybe go with me?”

Rickon narrows his eyes at her, trying to sort through everything she just said. He has never heard her talk that fast, and he is having trouble making out the individual thoughts. Doing his best to de-muddle his mind, he focuses on the last thought. “Wait,” he says slowly. “You want me to go to a party with you?”

Shireen groans loudly. “I can’t spend my entire underage life never going to a party,” she states, crossing her arms. She starts to twist her hands together “And while I’m definitely invited, I don’t really want to go alone. Please?”

“Okay, Shireen,” Rickon says, shaking his head slightly at her. The thought of going to a party with her is still a little mind-numbing. Rickon thinks about them dancing in an overcrowded room somewhere, pressed up really close to each other the entire time. He can feel a smile on his face and he tries to hide it somewhat, looking back to his homework.

Shireen scoffs. “Okay, you don’t have to make fun of me,” she says.

“How was I—?”

“I’m not going to force you to go if you don’t want to,” she goes on, now sitting back and staring up at the ceiling. Her feet start bouncing, and she pulls her hands through her hair.

“Shir, that wasn’t what I meant,” Rickon says, looking up and leaning forward. He reaches out for her foot, tugging on it slightly. “I’ll go with you.”

Shireen raises an eyebrow at him. “Then what was with that look?”

Rickon scrunches his face up and looks at her questioningly. In response, Shireen shakes her head slightly at him, a small smirk on her lips. _Oh_. She thought he was teasing her. Rickon wants to laugh. He wants to climb over her and kiss her until she knows that he’s not intentionally teasing her, but he can’t do that. He just bites his lip. Then, he breathes out a laugh. “My bad,” he says. “That does look kinda bad. But I’ll go with you, I promise.”

The reaction from Shireen is immediate and almost over-the-top. She half-jumps on his bed, reaching out for his hands, saying “thank you” over and over again. Rickon tries not to think too much of it. He knows that he was her back-up, that she’d much rather have a date to go with, and he’s willing to be just her friend for as long as she wants him to be. So he smiles at her and lets her ramble on about details of this party that’s supposed to be happening in about two months.

They sit in relative silence for the remainder of their time together. Occasionally, Shireen thinks out loud about what high school parties are like, or what she should wear, or if she should ask someone for answers. Rickon lets her talk on for as long as she wants. He doesn’t really see the purpose in going to a party, but he’s willing to go just to keep her safe.

However, in the next month, everything changes drastically. Rickon’s day had been starting out fairly normal until he doesn’t see Shireen all day. Usually, she’d have bumped into him a few times between classes, and they typically had lunch together or studied after classes were out. It leaves an ominous feeling in his stomach, and he almost calls her to ask about it before he realizes that she probably wants some alone time, too.

The night draws on, getting later and later, the sky blackening despite the change in season, and Rickon is entirely restless. He’s stayed up so far hoping that Shireen would appear at his door like she usually did, but when it’s close to midnight, he starts to lose hope. Just as he’s going to turn off the lights, a knock comes from his door. It’s a soft sound, quiet and tentative, and Rickon pushes back the thought that it is Shireen. Opening the door slowly, he’s only a little surprised to see her there.

“Edric asked me out today,” she blurts out. Her face is covered by a massive grin, and she can’t seem to hide the smile, nor does she look like she wants to. Her hands are twisting at her sides with a new kind of nervous energy, and she looks like she might explode.

Rickon, however, feels his heart drop. “That’s great,” he manages to get out. Slowly, he swallows, not trusting himself to say anything more.

“He wants to take me out to dinner next week, and he wants to go to the party with me!” Shireen tells him, walking into his room and taking a seat on the bed.

Closing the door behind her, Rickon avoids his gaze from hers. He wants to be happy for her, though, so he puts on a fake smile and asks about Edric the way a proper friend would. Shireen goes along with it, telling him all about how she got to sit with his friends at lunchtime, how he put an arm over her shoulders when they walked next to each other, how his eyes sparkled when he looked her way. Rickon has a hard time trying to keep his calm, and it isn’t until he starts giving trite responses that Shireen notices something is wrong.

“Hey,” she says suddenly, poking at his arm. “You’re not teasing me about this.”

Rickon just shakes his head. “I can’t,” he says slowly. “You’re just so happy about it, and I don’t want you to feel bad.”

“Even though it’s Edric?” Shireen questions, leaning forward slightly.

With a heavy sigh, Rickon falls back on his bed. “Yeah, I still think he’s a douchebag,” Rickon admits. “But you like him, so I’ll be nice for now.”

Shireen leans down to give him an awkward hug. “Thanks, Rickon,” she mumbles out. “But he’ll be perfect. Trust me.”

\--

Rickon wants to trust Shireen. He really does. But he does not trust Edric. He finds himself hovering around her classes, watching him interact with her. She acknowledges him before shooing him away and grinning over to her new boyfriend. Rickon just assumed they were dating now. Shireen certainly made sure to use the term whenever she could. She doesn’t spend as much time with him though. Even when Rickon knows she isn’t hanging around with Edric, she still isn’t with him, either. It peeves him slightly before he remembers that he shouldn’t care because she isn’t _his_ girlfriend.

They do still text, though, so Rickon knows it’s the day of her dinner date when Edric rather intentionally bumps into Rickon in the hallway. Automatically, Rickon tries to ignore him, pushing past him to get back to his room. Edric, however, grips his arms, pulling him around. Rickon glares at him, happy to find that he is taller than this Edric Storm.

“So Shireen talks a lot about you,” Edric says straightaway. Rickon’s positive that this isn’t supposed to be a friendly talk, so he doesn’t say anything. Edric waits for a response before moving on. “Says you’re real nice to her. Someone might think it’s because you have a crush on her.”

“We’re just friends,” Rickon says, pulling his arm away from Edric’s grip. He really doesn’t like the way this kid is talking, and he feels like he’ll be ready to throw a punch soon.

“Well, I happen to know that Shireen thinks of you as a brother,” Edric says, eyeing him for a reaction. He paces the hall a bit, giving Rickon a sorry look. “How sad to crush on someone who thinks you’re a sibling.”

Rickon whips a hand out grabbing Edric by the collar and shoving him against a wall. “Alright then,” he says. “If I’m like her brother, then you get this: a warning. You do anything to hurt Shireen and I will personally hunt you down. Got it?”

Edric’s shaking slightly, looking at Rickon with a worried expression. He swats at Rickon’s hand, but Rickon just tightens his grip. “Fuck off, Stark,” he spits out. “She made her choice and it wasn’t you. So back the fuck away from your little crush and let me have her.”

Loosening his grip for a split second, Edric relaxes before Rickon slams him back into the wall. He’s seething now, uncertain about what Edric’s plans are, but he’s positive that they don’t bode well. “ _You hurt her…_ ”

“Edric?”

Rickon turns to the voice, and he backs away from Edric immediately. Shireen is standing at the end of the hall, watching them with a worried expression. Rickon takes a deep breath. She wasn’t calling for him. She wasn’t concerned about him. She was worried about Edric. Rickon bites back a comment, turning back toward his room and walking away quickly.

“Wait!” Shireen calls after him. “Ric—”

“Let him go, babe,” Edric says.

Rickon turns in time to see Shireen curled into Edric, comfortably settled under his arm as he leads her away. He watches her go, looking moderately confused but still happier than he’s ever seen her. She doesn’t look back at him once. Shireen just smiles at Edric, letting him take her wherever he wants to go. The weight in his chest is unbearable. He feels like he’s lost some game that he was never really playing. Shireen doesn’t like him in the slightest. She’s got an Edric now, and he simply doesn’t compare.

Naturally, Rickon pushes the feeling down, ignoring it the best he can and trying to act like she never existed in the first place. Because if she didn’t exist, if he hadn’t fallen in love with her bright blue eyes and blunt, straightforward personality, none of this would be a problem, right? He wouldn’t know about any Shireen Baratheon or Edric Storm. He’d still be off picking fights for attention and trying to cause trouble. He doesn’t need her—not if she doesn’t need him. It doesn’t matter how much he time he wants to spend with her, how he’s wanted to kiss her for months, how he’s the only one who’s touched her scars. He isn’t important to her. Just because he’s in love with his best friend does not mean that she feels at all the same way back.

“Fuck,” he whispers to himself, slamming the door of his room shut behind him. Hastily, he digs out his phone and calls his brother. Pacing the perimeter of his room, Rickon controls his anger, not wanting to break anything in his dorm room. Luckily, Bran answers on the third ring. Before they even have a chance to greet each other, Rickon blurts out, “I love her.”

Bran is silent for a moment, obviously a little confused at the outburst. Finally, he says, “Well, go tell her.”

Rickon lets out a loud groan, falling onto his bed. The weight just won’t stop building, and it’s swallowing him, consuming him with a need to protect Shireen now that he knows what she means to him. He takes a deep breath. “I can’t,” he says. “She has a boyfriend.”

A long sigh comes from the other side. “Rickon… I don’t know what to tell you.”

“Tell me that her boyfriend is a douchebag who deserves to have his ass beaten into the ground so that I can actually do it,” Rickon suggests, slamming a fist into his mattress.

“No can do,” Bran says. “I’ve never met the guy. But if she’s happy, isn’t that more important?”

Sifting through the thought, Rickon justifies it. She’s smiling more. She definitely seems happier with Edric. And she hasn’t given him a second thought. Maybe they’ll get married one day and have babies, and Rickon will just continue to wallow in his lost high school love. “I guess,” he mumbles out. “But what do I do?”

“Be happy for her, Ric,” Bran says. “She’s got someone she likes that likes her back. If she’s your friend, then support her. Be her friend. Don’t just be someone who loves her.”

\--

Shireen is positively bursting from the attention that Edric gives her. He’s been a perfect gentleman so far, helping her into her seat, paying for their meal, giving her his arm. She’s sure that some outside forces are at work, finally bringing her the miracle she’s always wanted. They’re currently walking back to Skagos. It’s a slow crawl over the lawns, now littered with dying patches of snow since spring is so close. Shireen wants to savor them almost as much as she wants Edric near. They’ve kissed a few times now, and while they’ve all been short pecks, Shireen’s heart has nearly exploded from all of them.

He pulls her up close, then. Leaning down into her ear, he says, “So do you maybe want to go back to my room? My roommate’s out, and we can… get to know each other.”

Her face heats up quickly, and she lets her hair falls in front of her face to cover it. Trying to maintain her composure, she says, “I’m actually pretty tired… Maybe another time?”

Edric turns into her, pulling her hair back from her shoulders. “Come on, babe,” he says.

“Um, we’ve got class tomorrow, though,” she says quickly. Shireen gives him a sheepish smile, hoping to do away with the conversation all together. It was their first date. Did he really think that was all it took? “I have still have homework to do.”

Luckily, Edric just gives her a smile. His hands move down her shoulders, rubbing them lightly. “Alright,” he says. Then, he kisses her hair. “Maybe we can find some alone time at the party next week.”

“Sure,” Shireen agrees, stepping away slightly. Her mind is still reeling from the proximity of him and having his hand gripped around hers. She tries to keep her head, though. Shireen does not want this relationship to be like her others. With a small smile, she looks to Edric, wondering if he’ll kiss her again.

He does, though briefly, and Shireen feels like her head is spinning. With a wink he says, “Next time, babe.”

Sighing, Shireen watches him go. Then, she slowly makes her way back to her dorm, wondering what exactly he meant by ‘next time.’


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Picset](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com/post/127173498611/study-buddies-chapter-11)
> 
>  
> 
> Note: small trigger for attempted sexual assault in this one, before and after points have been marked with *** if you want to skip over it.

Seeing Shireen lately has been irritating Rickon. He doesn’t like hearing about how much she likes Edric, or how much he wants to fuck her, or how she wants to look pretty for him. It takes an extraordinary amount of effort for him to be around her now, knowing that she’s wrapped up in the thoughts of someone else. As it is, he spends an increasingly smaller amount of time with her every day. At first, Rickon just lets her go, trying to push her from his mind. However, he can’t help the feeling of protectiveness that swells in his chest whenever he thinks about her. Though he tries to swallow the feeling, it takes him over, and he sneaks past her classes every day to make sure she’s okay.

Rickon becomes royally pissed when he finds her wearing makeup one day. Not because he thinks she shouldn’t, but because he knows that she isn’t doing it for herself. She’s very obviously trying to cover up her scars, and the thought angers him before he just becomes sad.

With the onslaught of new thoughts, Rickon’s almost completely forgotten about the party that he was once invited to. Still, he hears people chattering in the hallways about it. Apparently, Wylla’s other ex Rodrik had offered up his parents’ house while they were away this weekend. Rickon tries to convince himself not to go, thinking through all the reasons why it would be completely horrible.

Between classes on Friday, he passes by Edric Storm, and he tries to block his ears from hearing anything they might have to say. Unfortunately, he gets caught up in human traffic and catches some of their conversation.

“Okay, I really don’t think it’s worth a hundred bucks,” he hears someone saying.

“Three hundred, then,” someone else supplies. “I mean, he even had to date her. Who knew it’d be so hard?”

“Thought she’d be desperate?” someone else asks.

“She _should_ be… but he’s already got fifty this year. Fuck, I wouldn’t even want to talk to her…”

“Shut up, guys!” Edric’s voice cuts through them. For a second, Rickon hopes he’s going to tell them to stop talking about his girlfriend like that, but he just says, “ _She’s_ coming.”

Frowning hard, Rickon searches them out to figure out where they’re looking. He’s praying to every god he knows that it’s not Shireen, but she appears out of the crowd of people, going straight up to Edric. She stretches up on her toes, kissing his cheek, and Rickon remembers how she used to do that to _him_. His face is burning from the memory, and he wants to reach for her again: to go back to the lazy afternoons lounging about on his bed. However, in his mind’s eye, there is a lot more touching and kissing involved.

Gritting his teeth, Rickon presses through the crowd, forcing his way through the bodies until he’s finally free. He runs off, avoiding his room in attempt to distance his self from the memories of Shireen. Eventually, he decides to go study in the library, wasting as much time as possible and roaming the stacks until he sees the school’s copy of _Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows_. With a smile, he takes the book, checking it out, and deciding that he will finish it.

He’s turning the corner to head back to his room when he crashes into someone. Automatically, he steps back, wondering how he managed to get so lost in thought to completely crash into a person. Rickon reaches out blindly, trying to steady them when a loud, “Rickon!” hits his ears.

Looking down slightly, he finds that he’s holding Shireen by the arms. He lets go quickly, rubbing at the back of his neck. She doesn’t move from her spot, staying extremely close to him. Rickon can see clearly how hard she was trying to cover up her scars. Unintentionally, he makes a face. Her eyebrows shoot up. He just shakes his head quickly. “What’s up?” he asks, hoping he still sounds normal.

Shireen lets out a small sigh before shoving a large envelope in his face. Her face lights up with a huge smile, and she says, “I got accepted to Winterfell!” 

She’s basically screaming here in the hall, and he can’t stop the grin from spreading across his face. “Congrats,” he says, steadying the envelope to read the return address. “Gonna go enjoy your time freezing your ass in the snow?”

“My ass can freeze itself off wherever it wants,” she responds. Shireen starts bouncing up on her feet again, pulling the envelope away from him and looking at it fondly. She hugs the paper to her chest. “I just wanted to let you know since you actually took me there…”

“Yeah, it was no big deal,” Rickon says, taking a small step away from her. He had been trying to forget about Thanksgiving break for the past week. He didn’t want to remember how she crept into his room, slid up next to him, hugged him tight, kissed his cheek… Rickon shakes his head to rid himself of the memories. Still, the images of her skipping around Winterfell University while his family shot sly smiles his way were at the forefront of his mind.

“And about the party tomorrow,” Shireen says slowly. She’s looking everywhere but at him now, and Rickon feels like he’s a guest at the worst reunion in the world. “I know I have a date now, but if you wanted to go, I can still get you in. Edric knows a guy…”

The taste in Rickon’s mouth immediately goes sour. He tries not to choke on the thought of her saying someone else’s name like that. “No thanks,” he says quickly. “I’ve got shit to do anyway.”

“Oh, okay then,” Shireen says. She still hasn’t looked back up at him, but she’s biting her lip hard enough that he thinks she might draw blood. Without thinking about it, he reaches for her face, resting his palm against her jaw and drawing her lip away from her teeth. Even through all the makeup, Rickon can feel her scars there, and he knows without a doubt that this is still _her_. She won’t go away: not from his thoughts, nor from his heart.

Shireen jumps slightly at the sensation. Though, she’s technically had a boyfriend now for the past two weeks, they’ve been oddly separate. Edric always put his arms over her shoulders, tugs her close to his chest, but he never let his displays of intimacy extend past her arms and her hands. He kisses at her hair sometimes and pecks her on the lips, but he never lingers there long. There is always some reason why he can’t stay there.

Looking up, Shireen catches Rickon staring at her. He doesn’t meet her eyes, though. His focus is solely on her mouth, and his thumb is still moving slowly against the line of her lips. Swallowing, Shireen’s mouth goes dry, and she instinctively licks her lips. The tip of her tongue hits his thumb gently, and his hand falls. His eyes flick up to hers for a brief moment, and Shireen feels like she’s been electrocuted. There’s a tight knot forming in her stomach, and she feels like she’s going to burn up. Rickon looks away quickly though, so she takes a step back.

“Anyway,” she says loudly. “I should be going…” Turning away, she makes for the end of the hall before Rickon snags her wrist and pulls her back.

“Hey, um, Shireen,” he says sheepishly. “He’s being nice, right? Edric, I mean… He hasn’t hurt you, has he?”

Shireen blinks up at Rickon, and he looks shy now even though the glint in his eyes could turn murderous at any moment. Slowly, she shakes her head. “No, he’s great,” she says. “Things are really good.”

“You’d tell me, right?” Rickon asks. He releases his grip just enough to loosely hold her by the fingers, his thumb running over her skin in small circles.

Ignoring the pounding in her chest, Shireen tries at a smile. “Nothing’s going to happen, Rickon,” she says firmly, drawing her hand away from his. There’s an odd sensation of loss there, and a part of her wants to take his hand again. “Don’t worry about me.”

With that, she turns away, biting her lip and heading back to her room. She’s almost out of that wing when she hears a faint call from behind her. Slowly, she turns around, and Rickon is waving a hand at her. “If he hurts you, I’ll kick his ass!” he calls. “Just say the word.”

Shireen shakes her head slightly, waving him off and continuing on her way.

\--

YouTube makeup tutorials have recently become Shireen’s favorite thing. She had never bothered with makeup before, mostly because she thought she was a lost cause where it was concerned. It is difficult for her to rationalize being with someone like Edric when her face is so jacked up, though, so she was trying. Shireen thinks she’s getting better at it. She just hates that it eats so much of her time in the morning and before she goes to bed. Still, today is going to be the best party of her life, and she is not going to go without some sort of barrier between her and the rest of the world. She dutifully puts on her makeup and gets dressed; making sure that she looks nice before leaving her room.

Edric is waiting for her down the hall. He doesn’t seem to notice anything different about her, making no comment on her appearance at all and taking her out to the cab her called that will take him to the party. Shireen follows him, letting his hands wander over her legs on the drive over. The sun is already setting, and Shireen swallows hard, knowing that she’ll be out all night. 

The party is already loud and full of movement when they get there. The low lights of the house are only just bright enough to see everything, though Shireen wishes that she knew what was actually happening. Edric leads her through the party, getting her a drink that she’s positive is alcoholic, and she swears to herself that she won’t have any of it. The throng of human bodies covers nearly the entire house, small as it is. Everyone seems to be enjoying themselves, though, but Shireen suspects that it is largely because they are intoxicated.

Still, she is determined to enjoy herself, so she plasters a smile onto her face. The music is loud, and she can’t hear anything except for the pounding bass line. The noise consumes her, though, so she just goes along with the rhythm of the party. In the corner of her eye, she spots familiar icy blue eyes and unruly auburn hair. She turns sharply. “Hey, Ric, you wanna dance?”

Edric smiles at her, and for a fleeting moment Shireen wonders why his hair isn’t auburn. Then, she shakes the thought. “Did you just call me Ric?” he asks, a smirk on his face. He clearly thinks that it is a new nickname for him.

“No, ‘Edric’!” Shireen says loudly. She’s almost intentionally screaming now. However, she can’t shake the feeling that she had just hallucinated seeing Rickon here. Still, she’s embarrassed at having called his name. “The music is just really loud.”

Edric nods, then shakes his head slightly at her. He takes her into the throng of people, pressing up close to her. His chest is to her back, and Shireen wants to turn so she can actually _see_ him. However, he has other ideas, grabbing her by the hips and pulling her close. Shireen tries to shy away, separating as soon as possible. Eventually, she just tells him that she needs to go to the bathroom so she can escape.

The bathroom is a quiet reprieve from the remainder of the party. The music is a dull thud against the walls, finally giving her time to think straight. It also has lights, and Shireen is nearly blinded by them. She shuts her eyes tight, blinking rapidly to get her focus back. In truth, she doesn’t have to use the bathroom, but she is dehydrated from not drinking anything for the past couple hours. Running the tap, Shireen cups her hands under the flow of water to get _something_ into her system, and it is all too refreshing.

After drinking her fill, Shireen carefully dries her face. She is very careful to keep her makeup intact, dabbing lightly over the splotches of water. When she is finally acceptable again, she leaves the bathroom. Almost immediately, she crashes into Edric. He has a smirk on his face, looking down at her. “Getting ready?” he asks.

***

“For what?” Shireen mumbles back. Edric just shakes his head at her, taking her by the wrist and into another room a few doors down. He walks into her, running his hands up her sides and dragging her dress up slightly. Quickly, Shireen grabs at the hem of her dress, pulling it down and wishing she wore something longer. “Edric, no, I—”

He shushes her, leaning down to kiss her shoulders. Shireen shudders when he tries to move further down, and she takes a step backwards. Unfortunately, she falls against a bed. Hastily, she tries to scramble off of it, but Edric pins her down. He smirks at her again. “Really, it’s been too long,” he says, grabbing her by the hips and rolling her over. “A full month…”

Shireen blindly aims a kick behind her, hoping that the heel of her shoe hit _something_.

“Fucking bitch!” Edric yells, stepping back and rubbing at the inside of his thigh. Taking a deep breath, Shireen scrambles for the door, only just opening it when he makes a fist in her hair and pulls her back on the bed. “Come on, babe. I thought you wanted to fuck me. We can even split the money.”

“Money?” Shireen says loudly. Edric, however, isn’t listening. He just tries to press into her further. Shireen aims a hand at his throat, clawing as hard as she can. He lets out a loud scream, stepping away from the bed with a hand to his throat. Shireen bolts to the door, running as fast as she can and tripping in her heels. Unfortunately, she crashes into someone blocking her passage, and she feels completely and utterly doomed.

***

She goes completely limp, falling to the ground and letting the panic hit her. Tears begin to stream freely from her eyes, and she tries to make herself as small as possible, crouching into a corner. Whoever was blocking the doorway ignores her, though she feels the brush of denim against her leg as they enter the room. There’s a small scuffle behind her that Shireen can only just make out, the loud music and her own sobbing already taking up most of her hearing. Belatedly, she thinks that she should run, and she gets to her feet shakily before remembering that she can’t run in heels.

Tearing off her shoes, Shireen tries again before crashing into a wall where a few people move away from her scrambling. A hand lands on her shoulder, and Shireen immediately pulls away from it. She tries to go another few steps before hitting another wall. This time, the hand on her shoulder is much gentler, and Shireen turns at the touch. To her immense relief, she finds Rickon standing behind her, holding out a hand and looking mostly angry. Shireen takes it, moving into his chest and letting herself cry.

Shireen is shaking more than anything, and Rickon wraps his arms firmly around her. He slowly leads her through the chaos of the party that seems to be ignoring them, taking her to the door. They’re nearly to the door when Shireen’s knees buckle and she falls against him further. He can hear her trying to mutter out an apology, but he just bends down to swing her up into his arms. He carries her out to the street and a few houses away. Shireen is still crying, her entire body heaving under the stress of the situation. Carefully, Rickon sits down on the curb, keeping her in his lap, and it is in this position that he calls a taxi to take them back.

The street is quiet save for her sobs, and Rickon looks around, watching the glow of the streetlights make small pools of orange on the pavement. One of his hands is still cradling her head, holding her against his chest firmly. His other hand is behind them, bracing up their weight. He lets his own breathing even out before he looks down to Shireen.

Her sobs have mostly subsided, and now she’s just an occasional hiccough in the still nighttime air. Rickon resists the urge to pull her tighter against him, and he lets her body go limp against his. She hasn’t looked up, not once, but Rickon wants to see her face. He wants to know that she’s okay. He wants her to know that she’s safe. Slowly, he shifts his weight to reach a hand up to her. His fingers skim her leg on the way, and she flinches away from him.

“Sorry,” he says quickly, moving both of his hands away from her.

Finally, _finally_ Shireen looks up to him. At once, Rickon is captivated by her eyes, but for an entirely different reason than before. They look sad, tired to the point of exhaustion, ready to give up. He can see that her makeup is smudged and leaving flecks of black everywhere, and she very clearly has streaks of makeup running down her face. All in all, she looks a wreck, but he isn’t about to tell her that. Shireen doesn’t say anything, but the corner of her mouth twitches up into a smile.

“Shireen,” he tries again. He hopes that’s she’s willing to listen, willing to respond. “Did he hurt you?”

There’s a moment where she doesn’t quite meet his gaze, then her head falls and she shakes it slightly. “Not… not like that,” she mumbles out. “I didn’t… I couldn’t…”

“You don’t have to tell me,” Rickon says. And that seems to be enough for her. Shireen moves into his chest again, shaking with quiet tears. She doesn’t flinch away when he hugs her close, though, and he strokes her hair gently as they wait for their ride.


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Picset](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com/post/127329654461/study-buddies-chapter-12)

For the next week, Shireen is mostly quiet. She shoves herself in corners, bundling herself up and keeping to herself. Rickon waits for her outside her classes every day, knowing that she doesn’t want to be around her classmates, particularly a certain Edric Storm. Rickon catches Edric looking her way a few times, but Rickon easily fends him off with a glare, taking Shireen’s hand and pulling her in the opposite direction. After a few days of this, he calls Sansa for advice, but she seems to be suggesting food instead of actually doing things.

As silly as it seems, Rickon still buys a ton of chocolate and ice cream, giving it to Shireen in small increments. He keeps his distance from her unless she asks him to be closer, and she very slowly moves back into the space she used to take up in his life.

One day, Shireen just walks up to him and declares, “I’m done.”

Rickon frowns at her. He gives her a small nod and asks, “With what?”

“Edric,” she says firmly. “He doesn’t exist anymore. It doesn’t matter.”

“So you don’t want any more chocolate?” Rickon asks, slowly pulling another morsel of it from his pocket.

“No, I want the chocolate,” Shireen says, snatching the candy from his hand. “How much did you buy anyway?”

Rickon shrugs, leading the way back to his room. “I’m not sure,” he says. “But maybe we can eat it with all the ice cream I got.”

Shireen’s eyes go wide. “There’s more ice cream?”

“Yeah,” Rickon says. “There’s a lot more.”

They sit around in silence, eating away at Rickon’s supply of post-break-up food. Shireen briefly mentions that he should have stocked up after Wylla, but he tells her that it was a recent acquisition. Though Shireen has declared she’s finished with Edric, Rickon still worries about her, despite the number of times she tells him that she’s fine and nothing happened. It takes a long time for Rickon to believe her, and he waits until she starts acting completely normal around him again. Two weeks later, she loudly proclaims that she’s going to swear off boys because they’re all massive fuckwads, and he starts believing her.

“I take it that I am also part of the fuckwads?” he asks, leaning over his chair to partially lie on his bed.

“Unfortunately, yes,” Shireen says. “While I can accept that some fuckwads may be better than others, there is no escaping that fact.”

“What about Bran?” he asks. “Is my brother also a fuckwad?”

Shireen bites her lip in thought, glancing around the room. “Okay, so maybe not all boys,” she says finally. “So I guess you get a pass, too.”

“Good,” Rickon says back, turning into his desk and back to his book. “That would have been hard to explain to my mom.”

Shireen laughs, and Rickon relishes in hearing her laughter again. She’s so much better to be around when she isn’t trying to please other people. He just genuinely enjoys her company. He carefully turns the page of his book, leaning down into his hands and staring down at the page. He can hear Shireen scooting closer to him, but he tries to focus on the page, knowing that he was now nearing the end. He hears her suck in a sharp breath behind him. Rickon rolls his eyes before turning over the page for the last time and reading the last few paragraphs. He can feel Shireen staring into his back the entire time, waiting for him to close the book. He finally does, and he takes a moment before turning to her.

“Well?” she asks loudly. Her eyes are as big as they can get, and she’s leaning as far forward as she can without falling off the bed.

After a while, Rickon just says, “Yeah, it was pretty all right.”

Shireen slumps down, letting out a breath of air. “That’s it?”

Rickon shrugs. “I mean, he probably shouldn’t have named his kid after some asshole,” he says. “But it was pretty good.”

“That’s better,” Shireen says firmly, rolling over to rest back in his pillows. Rickon looks over to her, watching her settle into his bed. She is completely at ease again, and he feels like he has her back. Even though she isn’t _his_ , she’s still his best friend, and he loves that more than anything. After a moment, Shireen mumbles, “I think I’m going to ditch class tomorrow.”

“Why’s that?” Rickon asks back. He moves to take up some of his bed, stretching in the process.

Shireen rolls over, looking at him before fixing his shirt. Her fingers fumble over the fabric for a moment, and Rickon can feel the touch against his stomach. Shireen just keeps smiling at him, though. “I just want a day to myself,” she says. “I think I need it.”

“Sounds good,” Rickon says, flopping down onto his bed. He gives Shireen a small look before rolling over. “I’m gonna take a nap.”

Her response is a trill of giggles, and Rickon is thankful that he is facing away from her, given that he can’t hide the smile that’s spreading across his face. Slowly, he drifts off, but not before he feels her hands combing through his hair.

\--

Though Rickon is fully aware that Shireen is not going to any of her classes today, he passes them anyway out of habit. None of her classmates seem to notice her absence in the slightest, continuing about their business as usual. However, Rickon can’t help but notice Edric looking annoyed at something his friends are telling him. Rickon is happy to see that the bruises he left on Edric’s face are taking a long time to recover, turning purple and green before going back to normal. There are also three faint red marks across his neck, and Rickon remembers when they used to look like welts: Shireen’s doing.

He smiles to himself in spite of everything, going to his own classes. It isn’t until after lunch that he notices Edric is unusually absent from the crowd. Following the bad feeling in his stomach, Rickon hurries off to Shireen’s room, pounding on the door.

“Shir!” he calls, knocking hard. “Are you in there?”

Rickon pauses briefly, listening at the door for any signs of movement. Hearing nothing, he pulls out his phone, calling her. He’s on his way to his own room now, walking with purpose. Shireen’s phone has gone to voicemail after ringing out three times now, and he’s starting to panic. Tapping his hands against the walls, Rickon rounds the corner that would lead to his room when he hears a faint scream from behind him.

Turning fast, Rickon moves in the direction of the noise, following it away from his room. When he hears the scream again, he is standing outside the communal bathrooms. Swearing to himself, Rickon walks in through the already kicked-in door of the girls’ bathroom, quickly looking around for the commotion. He nearly runs into the showers, hearing the steady fall of water, but he almost trips and steadies his pace out just enough so that he won’t fall.

Just as he expected, the form of Edric Storm is taking up the space of a stall, a broomstick tossed off to the side. He’s taking slow, steady steps forward, looking ready to spring, but Rickon snatches out for his collar, pulling him away. Edric slips under the different movement, falling to his ass. Rickon glances up for a second, seeing Shireen balled up in a corner of the shower, her knees tucked to her chest, a washcloth held in a fist over her chest.

Edric is scrambling to his feet, the soles of his shoes a squeak against the slick tiled floor. Aiming a foot into his hip, Rickon sends him to the ground again, watching him fail to hold himself up and hitting his head into the far wall. Sluggishly, he lifts a hand to rub at the back of his neck, looking worse for wear. 

Rickon walks to the door of the stall where Shireen was, averting his gaze from her as much as possible. He grabs her towel, tossing it to her through the running water. In his peripheral vision, he sees Shireen covering herself up. Once she’s decent, he reaches into the shower and turns off the water. Slowly, Shireen gets to her feet. He can see her shaking, clutching the towel to her chest. With a sigh, he pulls off his shirt and hands it to her. With a trembling hand she takes it, and Rickon turns his back to her so she can dress a bit better.

He sees Edric getting to his feet, making his way over, and his blood turns cold again. Narrowing his eyes at the boy, Rickon loudly says, “One wrong move and I will put you in the ground.”

Cowering slightly, Edric makes his way through the showering area, heading back to the door. On his way past Shireen’s stall, Rickon notices Edric trying to look in, so he takes a threatening step forward, which is enough to make him scramble away, slipping again on the wet tile. After a few attempts, he manages to leave the bathroom.

Sighing, Rickon hangs his head, wondering why the hell this would happen to Shireen of all people. He rests an arm on the doorframe, leaning all of his weight into it and contemplating if he should turn around. Then, he feels Shireen’s hand on the small of his back. Turning into her touch, he finds her standing sheepishly in front of him. His shirt is too big on her, and the dark fabric is becoming darker with her soaking hair over it. She’s still clutching the towel to her, holding it up with one hand, and she looks smaller covered up with everything. Rickon swallows the taste in the back of his throat.

Shireen glances up at him through her eyelashes. “Is he gone?” she mumbles.

Not trusting his voice, Rickon just nods. The responding sigh is louder than he expected, and Shireen starts to collect her things. Pressing his fingers to her wrist, Rickon moves her hand away, grabbing her things on his own and holding them in one arm. He extends his hand out to her, and she takes it tentatively, only just clutching his fingers.

They walk in silence through the halls, and it isn’t until they’re standing outside his room that Shireen says something. “Um, no offense, but why are we here?”

Knitting his brow, Rickon looks down at her and asks, “Don’t you still need to shower?”

“I was actually considering never showering again,” Shireen says softly. She has a death grip on her towel, and Rickon can understand why she’d be thinking like that.

He resists making a silly statement in return and leads her into his room. Rickon walks straight into his bathroom, putting down all of her stuff. He digs out a clean towel and takes it over to her. He places it on the bed next to her and says, “You can shower here. Whenever you need to. And I’ll lock myself out of the room and leave you here until you finish. I promise. I can wait for you in the library or something…”

Rickon lets the thought trail off, headed for the door. Something in Shireen snaps, and she reaches out blindly for him. Her nails are pressed to his exposed chest, and they both seem to realize that he still isn’t wearing a shirt. She sucks in a deep breath but refuses to remove her hand from his warm skin. Shireen watches his eyes flick down to her hand, and she stands up, stepping into him. “Please don’t,” she mumbles. Shireen can hear her voice cracking. “Don’t leave me. Just—”

This time, she trails off, letting the thought die there. She isn’t sure what to say, doesn’t know what she should tell him. Shireen is positive that nothing can stop terrible things from happening to her anymore. She’s cursed, but Rickon is the only thing stopping them from actually falling through. He can’t go. She needs him. He’s the only thing keeping her safe from everything trying to hurt her and she isn’t going to let him go.

Her mind is still reeling from the thought of having him gone. She can’t be left alone. Not now. Shireen is trying to figure out the best way to tell him this, and she can feel the panic filling her system. She can feel herself start shaking when Rickon grabs her hand, gently squeezing it.

“Okay,” he says softly. “I’ll stay.”

Shireen can feel her eyes beginning to fill with tears. She lets her hand fall, and Rickon’s goes with it until they are only just hanging together: her pinky finger hooked over his index finger. Even though she is fully aware that she needs to shower and clean up, she doesn’t want to be apart from him again. 

Rickon grabs the towel again, pressing it into her chest. “Go on, then,” he says. “I’ll be right here.”

Nodding, Shireen swallows. As slow as possible, she separates from him, closing the door of the bathroom. Almost over-aware of the fact that she is in Rickon’s room, she strips down, turning on the water. It runs hot quickly enough, and she lets it beat against her, imagines that it is burning away her memories of everything except Rickon. _Rickon, Rickon, Rickon_ playing through her mind: his fierce protectiveness over her, how he looks at her as if she’s worth looking at, his careless attitude for her scars, how gently he reaches for her…

With a sudden jolt, Shireen staggers on her feet. Holding onto the wall of the shower, Shireen bends over slightly, letting her hair fall in a wave around her. Her heart is racing, and she remembers his thumb over her lip, the look in his eyes when he finally met hers. Something in her stomach is clenching, and she goes to the floor, holding her head because _when did she start to actually_ like _him?_

He’s been her best friend since October, and it’s nearly May. How did this happen without her knowledge? She was even at his house with his entire family, and she _laughed_ at the idea of dating him.

“Fuck,” Shireen mumbles, turning to look through the door. She knows she can’t see him from here, not with the steam of the shower or the door in the way. Her heart is racing at the thought of having him there, so close when she was naked just a few feet away. Yet, he wasn’t trying to do anything.

Biting her lip, Shireen thinks through everything as she finishes her shower. Rickon has always been there, yes, but he hasn’t showed the slightest bit of interest in her. There were plenty of times where he could have tried to do something with her. Surely, if he had any attraction to her, he would have done something to let her know. Instead, he’s treated her like a sister, keeping her safe from other people and joking around with her. Shireen steadies out her breathing, letting it calm her.

Drying off, Shireen dresses slowly, determined to figure out right now if Rickon feels anything for her. After dressing, she exits the bathroom slowly, finding Rickon lying on his bed. He’s focused on the book he’s reading: something for class. When the door closes, he looks up for a moment. Glancing back to the book quickly, he puts it down, sitting up.

“Do you mind if I stay here a while?” Shireen asks. Her hands are twisting in front of her, and she suddenly feels nervous about asking.

“Of course not,” Rickon replies. He’s looking her dead on, and she can see that he has a finger shoved into his book as a makeshift bookmark.

Shireen takes a small step forward. “Do you… can I sit on your bed?”

He furrows his brow slightly, giving her an odd look. Then, he glances around the room. “Um. Yes?”

There is a heaviness to Shireen now, and she isn’t sure if it’s from the things that have happened to her or from being near Rickon again. She climbs next to him on the small bed, staying close to the edge of it. All of courage from being in the shower is gone, and she feels small and useless. Rickon chuckles at her. She looks up at him.

“You’re going to fall off like that,” he says. Grabbing onto his book, Rickon shifts his weight a bit, moving over in the process. Placing a hand on her hip, he moves her further onto the bed.

Shireen’s heart is a heavy thud in her chest, knowing that he’s just put them right next to each other, but then he moves away again. His focus goes back to his book, and she watches him read for a while. He keeps entirely to himself, though, not once glancing her way or reaching out to her. Her eyelids begin to grow heavy, and her heart is sinking, knowing that if he has affections, they are not for her. Still, she is unable to resist curling into him under the guise of sleep. Shireen is surprised when Rickon stretches out his arm for her to use as a pillow, but she accepts it nonetheless, snuggling up next to him and feeling her heart soar when his hand moves over her back.

Unfortunately, the movement is slow, and it doesn’t last. Soon, his hand is pressed to one spot on her back, safely placed over her shoulder. With a sigh, Shireen lets her body sag under the exhaustion of the day. She resigns herself to the fact that there is nothing between her and Rickon other than unrequited affection and a growing crush on her part.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Picset](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com/post/127490827626/study-buddies-chapter-13)

It isn’t really a surprise when Rickon gets called into the principal’s office. He was shocked enough finding out that Skagos _had_ a principal, having never met the person. Still, he responds to the summons, going to the office at the time specified. He walks slowly through campus, unconcerned with being late. He’s positive that they’re going to suspend him. If Edric Storm so much as mentioned what happened to his mother or his counselor, the blame would fall entirely on Rickon. He should have expected it, really. However, considering the other option was letting Edric hurt Shireen, he would be glad to take the suspension.

As Rickon nears the office in question, he starts to notice a lot more colors around him. All the walls in the rest of the school were bleached white, with absolutely no decorations. These were filled up with large murals and paintings, only a few spots left open for relevant school postings. Rickon assumed this was because it was the part of the school parents were likely to see, and he assumed that even they cared about appearances.

Sitting in a chair outside the office, Rickon leans back against the wall hitting his head in the process. He has outgrown these school chairs a while ago, and this one seems particularly small to him. He waits until the secretary calls him in, and he goes willingly, though a little slow. It isn’t until he was sitting across a desk from his principal that he realizes who he was looking at.

“Osha?” he asks. Osha is his counselor. The one he reports to once a week for updates on how his behavior is improving. He didn’t think she would be anywhere outside of that other room.

“Yes, Rickon,” she replies, shuffling through some of the papers on her desk. On closer inspection, Rickon realizes it was a collection of his reports. “Now, here’s the funny thing: all these incident reports of your fights are from last year—your freshman year. There’s nothing in here from this year. So why now?”

He shrugs, refusing to meet the look in his counselor’s eye. He can’t let her know anything about Shireen apart from what she already knew: they had been study partners, now they’re friends, end of story. He fixes his eyes at a point on her desk, hoping that she’ll think he’s trying to read the papers. “Too much time, I guess,” he responds. “Old habits die hard.”

Osha continues to stare at him, feigning thought. Then, she pulls out another paper and gives it a stare. “Not with grades, though?” she asks. “You’re acing all your classes this year.”

“Yeah, I forgot to start flunking them after that stupid study partner thing was over,” Rickon says, looking up at her with a smirk. “You can blame my study partner for that.”

“Rickon, I’m serious,” Osha says. “Edric is calling you out on two separate counts of assault. If we don’t take some sort of action, get some sort of motive to work through, you’re looking at suspension _and_ expulsion.”

Rickon looks down again. He knows the consequences. A part of him has been hoping that Edric hadn’t reported the first case, given that Shireen had done half of the damage. He’ll just get credit for both now. Still, he isn’t going to let Shireen get investigated now. So he plays it safe. “Yup.”

“I don’t want to make that call, Rickon,” Osha says, tossing his folder back onto the desk. She stands up, walking around until she is directly in front of him. Leaning back against the desk, Osha crosses her arms and looks down at him. “Now, stop with the bullshit and tell me what’s really going on.”

“I just really don’t like his face,” Rickon says, finally meeting her gaze. “Thought it needed more color.”

“Bullshit,” Osha shoots back.

“Those bruises definitely make him a lot easier to look at,” Rickon goes on. “It’s just artistic expression.”

“Stop lying to me, Rickon,” Osha says. “I’m not going to expel you unless this was entirely unprecedented.”

Rickon stands up. He’s nearly as tall as his counselor now, though it shouldn’t surprise him too much. He leans forward a tiny amount and says, “Then, I’ll go beat the shit out of that fucker again. And you can expel me all good and proper.”

Before Osha can respond, Rickon is out the door, racing back to his room. His words will count as motivation enough. He’s been lectured on it before, gotten in trouble for less. As much as he’d love to be done and gone from this school, he knows that this is not the way to go. His parents have already threatened to send him to Dorne before, but he’s willing to go if it’ll keep Shireen safe. Rickon had been hoping on finishing the year without incidents and going back to Winterfell next year. _Closer to Shireen,_ he thinks futilely. It’s not in the cards anymore. But she’s safe, and that’s what really matters. He slows down just before rounding the corner, seeing Shireen just ahead of him.

His heart is still pounding, and he isn’t breathing normally. Still, he puts on his best face and walks past Shireen, tapping her shoulder in the process to get her attention. The smile on her face fades when she really looks at him, and he isn’t sure what his expression looks like but it has to be telling to garner a reaction like that. It’s enough so she’s frowning at him when they get inside, and he’s got a smile stuck on his face. He has to tell her, even though it’ll probably be the lynchpin in their relationship. Maybe it has all gone to shit anyway. He already fucked up dating Wylla, and she was with Edric. Now, it’s just pounded further into the dirt, and he can’t even hope to end the year with a goodbye kiss.

“I’m getting expelled,” he announces before she can ask. He flops down on the bed, taking up most of the space. There’s a strange feeling in his stomach and Rickon can’t tell whether he wants to scream or laugh.

Shireen furrows her brow at him. “What did you do?”

Rickon gives her a confused look. She looks genuinely curious about his going-ons outside of their study sessions. Then, he thinks that she’s just blocked the memory from her system. She shouldn’t have to remember it anyway, though. Shrugging, Rickon says, “Got into another fight.”

“Another…?” Shireen trails off, wracking her brain in thought. She spends a good majority of her time with Rickon now. It doesn’t add up. There simply hasn’t been enough time for him to get into a fight without her knowledge. Then, the memory hits her and she feels nauseated. “Oh, Rickon, no. That’s my fault, and it’s—”

“I got into a fight, Shireen,” Rickon says sharply, cutting her off. He sends a glare her way, and she takes a step back. Then, the moment passes and Rickon is flat on the bed again, looking up at the ceiling. “Punched the fucker in the face, just like he deserves, and I’ll get expelled for it. Big deal.”

She watches him, waiting to see if there’s another bomb that’s going to go off. Sure enough, his phone starts ringing and he visibly sours. Shireen waits at his desk, wondering who is calling and whether or not he’s going to pick up. He does, but only after it’s nearly rung out.

“Yes,” he says firmly. A poor greeting that Shireen is positive is a response to the expected question. “Because he was a douchebag who deserved to get punched in the face. Now, fuck off.”

He hangs up the phone, tossing it halfway across his bed. Rickon rolls halfway over, away from her and facing the wall. When his phone starts ringing again, he brings his arms up to cover his ears and presses into his pillows. As quietly as she can manage, Shireen steps forward, checking the caller ID of his phone. It’s his mom. Shireen picks up the phone with careful fingers, accepting the call. She doesn’t say anything though, and his mom doesn’t realize that the call had been answered.

“Rickon?” she says slowly. It’s the soft, tentative voice of a caring mother, and Shireen’s heart aches at hearing it. “Rickon, just talk to us… tell us what happened.”

Shireen glances over to Rickon, watching him. He hasn’t moved at all, and Shireen feels like he’s been frozen in place by some unknown weight. “Um, Rickon’s not…” she starts slowly.

“Shireen!” Catelyn exclaims. “Oh good, you’re with him. What happened?”

At once, Rickon sits up sharply, giving her a clear expression: she isn’t allowed to tell his mother what actually happened. Shireen swallows hard. “I-I don’t know, Mrs. Stark,” she says. “He won’t tell me.”

His mother makes another comment, but Shireen is distracted but the look of Rickon. He looks beaten, like he’s given up on the massive game he’s been playing, forced to make the sacrifice play despite being able to win. Shireen quickly mutters out, “I have to go, Mrs. Stark,” and hangs up the phone without waiting for a response. Then, she wraps her arms around Rickon tightly, pressing into him on the bed. She falls over onto him, burying her face in his neck, and tears are springing into her eyes. “You don’t have to protect me, Rickon,” she mumbles, and even she can hear her voice shaking.

Rickon shakes his head, pulling away from her slightly and sitting up. He meets her gaze evenly. Though Shireen had been hoping to see some flicker of affection, there is none, but there is _something_ —something she can’t quite identify. Then, his eyes look down and he says, “Yes, I do.”

Shireen shakes her head, ready to give herself up. She’ll let the Skagosi question her entire existence if it means getting Rickon safe, if it means living near him next year. “Ric—”

“They’ll call your father first,” Rickon says evenly. He takes her hands gently, pressing them to his mouth. “And they’ll tell him everything. He’ll probably come, along with your mom, and they’ll get to see everything. _Everything_ , Shir. All those insignificant things in your life here, they have it written down, ready to be analyzed by some psychiatrist somewhere. They’ll know about going with me for Thanksgiving, and that’ll lead to a phone call with my dad. My dad who has been trying to figure out _how you exist_. Alright? It’s not going to come to that. I swear. I’ll take the shot.”

Suddenly, the impact of what Rickon is implying fills her. She doesn’t exist outside of this school. She never has. No one knows about her. If anything happened, she’d be questioned relentlessly. If she was investigated, they’d find some way to make it her fault. She’d be sent to some other institution. She’d never be allowed to have an adult life. If she somehow made it out, she’d be found immediately. There are thousands of people who hate her father for being a senator. She’d be questioned relentlessly to belittle his position. 

“You’re going to get away from them, Shireen,” Rickon says, drawing her out of her thoughts. “All of them. You’re going to go to university, and you’ll be safe.”

\--

There is a new sense of determination fueling Shireen now, and she refuses to let Rickon out of her sight. She follows him to all of his classes, and though he seems entirely annoyed by this, she continues doing so. Shireen is resolute in making sure that Rickon gets the lightest sentence possible, and she’s constructed a lie that she hopes will get him off the hook. Rickon is adamant on refusing her help, and he keeps trying to convince her to just let it go. Still, Shireen tries, and she watches him receive the summons back to the principal’s office just before she gets to class. Rickon pushes her into the room before leaving.

She hovers near the door until her teacher calls her inside. Her stomach is twisting, and she feels like she’s going to explode if she leaves him to that fate. It’s been a few minutes, and her class has since ignored her, though she’s positive that she is the cause of the giggling. Shireen knows she looks unkempt; she’s dressed a bit sloppily. Still, her heart is pounding, and she will hate herself if she lets him go now.

Without another thought, Shireen runs from the room. Immediately, she thinks that she’s already wasted too much time. How long was that meeting going to last anyway? Hurrying through the campus, Shireen runs straight into the principal’s office, completely foregoing the secretary and bursting in through the door. She’s ready to spill forth everything she’s prepared, but she stumbles somewhat, seeing a lot more people than she expected in the room. The words almost fall out anyway, but Rickon rushes over, putting a hand over her mouth and shushing her.

“Hello, Miss Baratheon,” the principal says calmly, glancing over to her. “Is there a reason why you’ve joined us?”

“No, she was just leaving,” Rickon says firmly, giving her a look.

Shireen glances around, seeing all of the Stark family in the room. A part of her wants to question why they all came for the meeting, but the other half of her wins out. She turns sharply to Rickon. “Tell them.”

“No,” Rickon repeats, giving her a hard stare.

“You tell them or I will,” Shireen threatens, narrowing her eyes at him.

Rickon matches the look. Then, he puts a hand on her back and pushes her out of the room, saying, “Excuse us a moment.” He shoves her gently into the hallway and walks her a few doors down before saying “no” again.

“You are not getting shipped off to some unknown corner of the world because of me,” Shireen hisses out. “Now, go tell them.”

“It would hurt you more,” Rickon says quietly. Somewhere behind him, a door clicks. He doesn’t notice. “I am not going to ruin your entire future.”

“Would you just fucking tell them what that asshole did?” Shireen says. She’s yelling now, frustrated at how often her life doesn’t work out. It all started with her misfortunate childhood disease, and now her ex-boyfriend is ruining her hopes of any kind of future. There’s anger and frustration building in her, mounting into something tangible, and she just wants it gone. So she screams it out. “Just tell them what he almost did to me! Tell them how he hurt me! Tell them that you stopped him from—!” She chokes on her words, her emotions draining out and leaving the fear and terror from what almost happened. Tears fall freely from her eyes, she’s shaking, and she would have fallen to her knees had Rickon not caught her.

His mouth is pressed against her hair, and she can feel his lips moving when he tries to shush her again. A soft weight rests on her back, and she leans into him, overcome with the feelings and hoping for the safety he provides. She takes a deep, shaking breath against him, wrapping her arms around his waist and holding him tight. He won’t go. He _can’t_ go. He can’t leave her. Her hands claw at his back weakly, doing anything she can to press him closer, just short of wrapping her legs around him and kissing him full on the mouth.

He doesn’t leave, though, and he’s waits patiently in the hallway with her for what feels like hours until her breathing has finally returned to normal. Shireen takes another breath in, glad that it meets no opposition on its way. Lessening her grip the smallest amount, Shireen chances a look up to him. His eyes are closed, but his hand is still moving over her back, keeping her together and making a steady rhythm that digs into her heart.

After a long while, Rickon looks down at her. He was afraid of this reaction: that the memories would haunt her and hurt her, and she’d be forced to recover all over again. She has a weak smile on her face, even though her face is wet, and she squeezes him gently before pulling away.

Raising a hand to her scarred cheek, Rickon runs his knuckles over them. “That’s why I didn’t want to,” he says softly. “They hurt you, too.”

“But you were here,” Shireen replies. Her smile widens at him, and Rickon feels the spark from her look flaring to a bright burning flame all over again. “You were here to save me.”

“A strong, stubborn girl like you doesn’t need saving,” Rickon says. He’s tempted to lean into her, kiss her now, but he remembers his family and thinks twice about it. “But I’ll help where I can.”

They get to their feet slowly, and Rickon is surprised that only a few members of his family are still in the area. He turns back to Shireen, though, helping her to her feet and giving her a small hug. She lets him go slowly, stepping away from him and the family that’s still standing behind him. Rickon lets out a sigh, copying her motions and looking back at the people in the hall: Osha, Sansa, and his parents. Sansa brushes past him, and he hears her muttering to Shireen and leading her away.

Osha clears her throat loudly, drawing Rickon’s attention back. “I think there are a few more things to discuss.”


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Picset](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com/post/127644838371/study-buddies-chapter-14)

“Dude, I thought you were going to start making out with her right then and there.”

Rickon turns to his brother, rolling his eyes slightly. He’s walking back toward the dorms. Bran hobbles along beside him, and Rickon would kick him over if he thought it would have any effect on his brother. The crooked grin that Bran wears is pissing him off though, so he looks away, shoving his hands in his pockets.

“Maybe if things weren’t so fucked up,” he replies.

“Apparently, you both have Winterfell to look forward to,” Bran reminds him.

Smiling at the thought, Rickon looks down to the ground and kicks at the grass. He’s beyond happy that everything worked out. Osha agreed to keep everything quiet until Shireen graduated, which Rickon negotiated after figuring out that her birthday is tomorrow. Then, the adults in the room had agreed on a proper punishment for Rickon, which ended up being an apology dinner on their part for not figuring out the whole truth before misinterpreting the situation. Everything was finally going well, and Rickon had even gotten explicit permission to punch anyone who tried to hurt Shireen. As long as he was acting in her defense, he was in the clear.

“Okay, but where are we eating?” Arya calls from behind him. Rickon isn’t even annoyed by his sister’s impatience. She probably had to spend time moving her schedule around for the drive out here, and it only makes sense that she’d be peeved about it. Then again, Rickon supposes he should thank her. Apparently, all of his siblings had insisted on coming so they could speak in his defense to keep him out of even more trouble that he was going to get.

“There’s some fancy place a few miles away,” Rickon says, turning toward his sister. “Dad’ll probably take us there, so you can go tell Gendry and head off.”

“Thanks, bro!” Arya calls, skipping away and pulling out her phone. Bran and Rickon share a laugh when she almost crashes into a tree, and they talk about how she’s been completely smitten with her boyfriend lately.

“Speaking of which,” Bran says slowly. “Are you going to invite your girlfriend to dinner?”

Rickon bites his lip before turning to face Bran. “We’re not dating,” he admits. “I don’t even think she likes me. I mean, she hasn’t—we haven’t—there’s been nothing, man.”

Bran widens his eyes at him. “Dude, you are fucking blind,” he breathes out. “I thought she was going to start kissing you when she barged into the room, definitely in the hallway.”

“No,” Rickon says firmly. It’s more of a reminder to his self than anything. “She’s been through a lot. There’s no way she wants to deal with some underclassman relationship when she’s going to university in the fall. I’ve just gotta let her go.”

“You’re totally wrong, dude,” Bran insists. 

While Rickon would love to believe him, he isn’t ready to get his hopes up. Sure, he may have thought about what it could be like. He’s spent more than a few hours imagining what it would be like to kiss her, hold her close, but he knows that there’s no way she wants to date him when she’ll have a new batch of college guys to go after next year. Honestly, he should just count his losses now and enjoy whatever of their friendship remains. Still, he has been told to invite her, so he walks over to her room through the crowd of students getting ready to enjoy their weekends.

He knocks on the door, and Shireen peeks out, looking a bit more put-together than usual. She smiles at him, opening the door wider. Rickon notices that’s she’s changed: now she’s wearing a nice blouse and skirt that are making his mind wander. Her hair has also been combed and styled so that it falls nicely around her face. Swallowing hard, he tries to get his mind straight. Unfortunately, the only thing that comes out of his mouth is, “You look nice.”

Bran snorts from beside him, muttering out some reason for needing to leave immediately and moving away. Rickon shoots a glare after his brother, but when he turns back, Shireen is blushing. “Um, thanks,” she mumbles.

Then, Sansa appears at her shoulder. “I told her she just needed to get dressed,” Sansa says firmly. “It’s amazing what a new outfit will do for you.” Sansa is smiling warmly at Shireen, holding onto her shoulder and fixing the fall of her hair. Shireen doesn’t say anything, simply standing there, and looking out past him.

It isn’t until they’ve been standing around in silence for a full minute that Sansa realizes she’s intruding and leaves quickly, following after Bran. However, the silence presses on. Shireen is shifting her weight from foot to foot, and Rickon has taken to staring at her necklace. After a long time, Shireen clears her throat, and Rickon remembers why he’s actually here.

“So my family’s going out to dinner,” he says abruptly. His voice sounds strange to him now, like he isn’t supposed to be talking or disrupting the spell that was over them. He glances up to Shireen’s face to see a softer smile there.

“I suppose they needed something to do since they all got together,” Shireen says. She also sounds different, though Rickon can’t figure out how. “Did they really all need to come?”

“My siblings wanted to help me out if they could,” Rickon tells her. “Though, I think it was mostly Bran’s doing.”

Shireen giggles. “Yeah, he’s definitely not a fuckwad.”

They lapse into silence again, and Rickon’s heart starts beating faster. He can feel the day going on, and he feels like he needs to just tell her everything. “Did you maybe want to come with us?” Rickon asks instead. He feels stupid for wasting the moment, seeing Shireen’s smile dip before reappearing on her face.

“Um, yeah. Sure,” she says. He watches her glance back into her room, grabbing onto something before coming into the hall again. Her hands hang in front of her, and she looks a little nervous standing next to him. It isn’t until she raises her eyebrows at him that he realizes he hasn’t moved.

Rickon hastily gestures out into hallway, leading her back to his room by force of habit. He enjoys walking with her, and some part of his mind has decided that they’re just going to hang out for the day. Unfortunately, Arya is there waiting for him, Gendry in tow.

“Great,” she says, kicking off the wall she was leaning on. “Hurry up so we can go.”

“Um, right,” Rickon says, trying to switch gears from hanging out to getting dinner. He excuses himself into his room to allow his self a small amount of time to refocus. His brain is cloudy with thoughts of Shireen, and he just wants to spend time alone with her. He wants to figure out what’s going on. In order to seem less scattered, Rickon changes his shirt, hoping that everyone will think that was his intention the entire time. Buttoning up his shirt, he checks his pockets before heading back into the hall.

Shireen is laughing at something Gendry is telling her, and Arya is making large, sweeping gestures with her hands. Without bothering to acknowledge him, Arya starts walking off, leading the way to where the remainder of the Stark family waits. As they go, Shireen reaches out for his hand, gently clutching his fingers before letting go again. Rickon tries to keep the smile off his face when his family starts coming into view, and he realizes that Dacey, Sandor, and Jojen are also with them. Rolling his eyes, Rickon looks on at his loud family before they split up into cars. Rickon insists on going with Arya and Gendry in attempt to save Shireen from an awkward conversation with his dad.

They end up at Kingshouse, the nicest restaurant in relative proximity to Skagos. Shireen has since melded back into her usual boisterous personality around his family, laughing and joking with them. Rickon does his best to get back into it, too, playing off of Arya’s penchant for swearing and speaking her mind on anything and everything. Soon, things feel like they’re back to normal until Shireen’s hand brushes his in the space of the seat between them, and Rickon’s heart jumps. He fights the impulse to draw away or take her hand, but she doesn’t seem to notice the issue at all, continuing the conversation as if everything is fine.

The Stark family gets into the restaurant, waiting for the staff to put tables together to accommodate them. Eventually, they seat themselves, still being their usual loud selves as they chatter on and on. Shireen seamlessly fits into all their conversations, sharing stories of the school year and the things she and Rickon did together, which eventually leads the conversation back to him.

“But why did you all come today?” Shireen asks. “Aren’t meetings supposed to be smaller?”

His sisters start laughing immediately, and there is an amused smile on Bran’s face. Then, Robb speaks up. “This was supposed to be Rickon’s ‘We’re-glad-you’re-coming-back-home’ dinner,” he tells her. “Which I guess it still is; there was just a bit more excitement beforehand.”

“We just wanted to celebrate you coming back,” Catelyn says, smiling at her youngest. “It’ll be so good to have the family close again.”

“So you get to enjoy the rest of your high school life with your old friends?” Shireen asks, turning to face him.

“New ones, too,” Rickon says. “Or are you not going to tell them the news?”

His parents turn to Shireen with curious expressions and Shireen swats a hand at Rickon’s arm before facing them. “I was accepted to Winterfell University,” she tells them, a smile growing on her face. The table bursts with congratulations over the meal, but Shireen raises a hand to stop them. “I’ve still got to wait and see if I get a scholarship to go there. I mean, I have to live somewhere.”

“You could always stay with us,” Ned offers.

“Oh, I couldn’t,” Shireen says, waving off the offer. “I mean, Rickon’s probably sick of me by now.”

Down the table, Bran and Jojen simultaneously snort and start laughing. Rickon very pointedly refuses to acknowledge them. Shireen is still going on about how the process has been going, shying the conversation away from her inevitable move-out from her parents’, even though Ned knows all about it. Rickon relaxes in his seat, leaning back and watching his family.

Feeling the presence of a stare on his back, Rickon looks around, meeting the gaze of a particularly infuriated Edric Storm. He’s too close for Rickon to feel comfortable, and Rickon has a feeling that he followed them here. Still, Rickon ignores him, turning back to the conversation and immersing his self in it. He keeps feeling the stares, though, and Shireen seems to notice as well. She turns only slightly until Rickon reaches under the table for her leg, diverting her attention. Shireen gives him a weak smile, and they help one other keep from switching their focus.

However, a particularly loud comment about scars reaches the entire table. Shireen visibly swallows, but she looks pissed. Across the table, Sandor also bristles, and Rickon notices his sister trying to soothe him.

“The whole bunch of them probably lying to her ugly ass scars,” Edric says loudly. “Not that she was even worth the bet.”

Shireen goes stone still, and Rickon has half a mind to go over and beat him into the ground again. With a loud sigh, Shireen tosses her napkin to the table and says, “Excuse me.”

For a moment, Rickon thinks she’s going to go to the bathroom to get away, but she marches straight up to Edric, a fist raised and ready to throw a punch. Rickon hurries to his feet, following after her.

“Hey, asshole!” she calls loudly, throwing the punch the instant he turns. “You wanna try telling that to my ugly ass scars?”

Rickon hears his brother mutter out a “holy fuck” from behind him, but he just makes his way to Shireen’s side.

Edric is rubbing at his jaw, but he manages to laugh, turning to his friends at the table. “Hey, if I kiss her again, can I have another twenty dollars?”

Shireen aims a slap directly across his face, and Edric staggers to the side. Rickon knows from experience how much that hurts, and his own face tingles at the memory.

“You fucking bitch,” Edric hisses out. “I fucking offered to pay you, too.”

“Yeah, well, I’m not a whore, you douchebag,” Shireen shoots back. “So get lost.”

Rickon takes her wrist gently, pulling her back to their table. He loves seeing her defending herself, but he doesn’t want her to end up hurt again. She’s stubborn about turning back, muttering a string of swears under her breath.

“Hey!” Edric shouts. Shireen turns at the noise. His drink is in hand, and he tosses the liquid up into Shireen’s face. The stain of it is already on her shirt, and Rickon is ready to pounce. Her breathing catches, though, and Rickon’s anger morphs back into concern for her. “Makes you prettier,” Edric goes on. “Even better than all that makeup.”

Shireen stands still, and Rickon thinks she’s mostly in shock. However, she manages to throw another punch at Edric before she flees from the area, and this time she does head for the bathrooms. Rickon turns back to Edric, ready to beat him to a pulp, but he is stopped by a large hand on his shoulder. The massive form of Sandor is hovering over them, his own scarred face on clear display to Edric. With a small push from Sandor, Rickon runs off after Shireen.

He finds her sitting on the floor between the bathrooms, obviously having lost the motivation to keep going. She protests when he helps her to her feet, but he does so anyway, leading her into the bathroom. She hiccoughs loudly, and Rickon lifts her onto the counter before fetching paper towels that he dampens and cleans her face with. Shireen looks distraught, and won’t meet his gaze even though his eyes are trained on hers.

Rickon slowly reaches for the hem of her shirt. “Do you want to maybe…?” he asks weakly.

She nods frantically, taking of her shirt quickly. Then, she lets out a sigh. “Even my undershirt is ruined,” she mumbles, pulling that off, too.

Swallowing hard, Rickon looks away, uncertain about _this_ being the reason he sees her unclothed. She doesn’t seem bothered at all, though, turning a bit and rinsing locks of her hair in the sink. Rickon busies himself washing her shirts. Eventually, he realizes the effort is useless because they’re sticky with syrup and stained through. He tosses the shirts back, unbuttoning his own. He has a plain undershirt on, so he hands her the other.

“So you can… so you don’t have to…” He can’t make his tongue work, twisted as it is with the thoughts of her being right there. Training his eyes on anything but her, he keeps himself from thinking about her because surely she’ll be able to read his thoughts in the quiet, dim light of this bathroom.

Shireen takes the shirt, shrugging into it and pushing the sleeves up to get her hands out. Her hands fumble with the buttons before she just sighs. “I can’t—Could you help me?”

Rickon looks over to her, and finally she’s looking back. She’s no longer weepy, nor does she seem bothered by being in such an exposed state. Shireen is entirely steady, but she asked for his help. Slowly, he moves to stand in front of her, reaching out for the buttons of his shirt. Suddenly, his hands are shaking and his vision is being attacked by the sight of her: the fold on her belly from where she leans over, the smooth skin over her ribs, and a lacy bra that he’s positive he’s never supposed to see. He spends a moment locating the bottommost button and hole, trying to match them.

“Rickon?” Shireen says. His eyes flick up to hers, doing his best to avoid looking at anything he shouldn’t be seeing. There’s a definite spark there, and his mouth goes dry. She’s looking at him intently, looking for something _in_ him, and he briefly wonders what she sees there. She gives him a small smile. “Kiss me.”

“What?” he sputters out. His heart has definitely stopped working, and he’s delusional.

Shireen stares at him, infatuated with his gaze that he’s trying so hard to keep modest. His eyelashes have been flickering up the entire time, though, sneaking sly glances over her breasts and stomach, and she doesn’t care if she’s taking a leap of faith because when he looks up at her, her heart pounds. “Kiss me,” she repeats, leaning into him slightly.

She’s only just taller than him on the countertop, but he reaches up slowly, brushing his fingers over her scars. Her heart is racing out of her chest, and she feels time slow down around them when he stretches up on his toes to meet her mouth fully. Then, nothing exists except the fact that this is Rickon: this is her best friend, and she is kissing him, and it is better than anything she has ever experienced. His lips are warm against hers, moving and pouring emotions that she didn’t know he had into a kiss she never expected. Still, he is reaching for her. His hand finds her waist almost without effort under the shirt, and his fingers curl around to her back.

Shireen lets out a small gasp against his mouth, and his tongue is begging entrance, waiting on the edge of her lips as he draws them closer and pulls them into his mouth. Throwing caution to the wind, Shireen makes her tongue hit his, sliding around it until they are dancing together, solidifying the feeling of how it is _Rickon_ , and he is _here_ , and gods, he might even love her. A tight knot forms in her stomach, and she just wants him closer. Of their own volition, her hands dig into his hair, curls she has combed out, soft auburn that she knows, but has never thought of like this: as her only purchase on him that draws him near. 

At the same time, her legs spread apart, and he steps into her, taking up the space she’s only just created. His hand slides up her back, pressing their chests together, and she wonders fleetingly if he can feel her bra through his shirt. Shireen presses her breasts against him, eliciting a soft moan from him. Rickon’s mouth begins to move faster, and she can feel how hungry he is for her. It’s as if he’s been storing up all these emotions, and he’s just let the floodgates open, letting him spill into her and consume her, and she is lost in it, but she doesn’t want to get out. She wants to drown at the bottom of this lake that is _Rickon_ , and there is nothing that can make her leave.

With a soft draw away, Rickon begins pressing kisses down the side of her face, branding over the scars that once defined her, and she is being re-written with his love because whatever else could have possessed him to kiss over a part of her that is so thoroughly ruined? Her breaths are shaking for an entirely different reason now, and Rickon’s hand drops to her waist, sliding down to knead into the soft flesh of her ass, tugging her closer to him. His other hand holds her to his mouth that is questing over her skin to find her, know her, claim her.

When Rickon returns to her mouth with a soft, tentative kiss, she finally opens her eyes to see him, wondering how he’s changed now that she’s invited him to break down the wall between them. He’s ready for her gaze, meeting her evenly, and Shireen is surprised to see that it is the same. Only now, she knows what it means, and she breathes out a soft, “Oh.”

Rickon smiles at her, holding her behind her neck to kiss her fully before drawing away and resting their foreheads together. His warm breath hits her mouth as he repeats, “Oh.”

Gripping his shoulders, Shireen leans into him further, determined to kiss him back, uncertain that she even did anything that first time. She hooks her legs around his waist, pulling him close and her nails scrape over his scalp, drawing his mouth open for her again. They pull away from each other again; Shireen’s fingers a light brush over his jaw as he looks at her, locking their eyes together when she lifts her gaze from his mouth to meet his.

Then, he chuckles, leaning into her. “Turns out you do have sex eyes,” he mumbles. “They’re just not what I thought.”

Shireen doesn’t stop the bubble of laughter from leaving her. She lets it spill out into the air as she averts her eyes. Rickon’s arms are still wrapped around her, and her hands are resting on his chest. She sweeps her fingers in light circles over his shirt, smoothing out the wrinkles she creates. Then, she slowly looks up, determined to truly look at him. She follows the line of his jaw back and forth before finding his lips. They’re still parted from kissing her, and he is still breathing hard. She can see them moving from the effort of breathing, and she suddenly realizes how much effort it is when kissing him had been so easy. Shireen becomes distracted by the smattering of freckles across his nose because surely she would have noticed those by now. Still, they’re fairly faint, so she brushes her fingers over them, and Rickon’s eyes flutter closed at her touch. His eyelashes are long, brushing the tops of her fingers.

Rickon lets out a sigh before looking up at her again. Freezing under the intense look from his icy blue eyes, Shireen feels something pulling at her heart. Then, his mouth tugs up into a smile and his hands come to life again, sweeping up her sides gently. She clears her throat, looking down at her lap and letting her hands fall.

“So, um, you didn’t actually have to kiss me,” she mutters. A new kind of weight settles in her stomach, and she feels uneasy now. She’s stepping out into uncharted waters. Never has she harbored such hopes for being with someone, and she knows that no one would actually kiss her save for dares and bets. Shireen needs to clear the water immediately. She needs to know what she’s swimming in.

Shireen is preparing herself for a new kind of rejection—the most heartbreaking kind—when Rickon _laughs_ at her. He rests his head on her shoulder through his laughter, and his fingers are pressing into her back. His hands ease out first, rubbing over the skin again, and then he gives her a shy look. “I’ve been trying to kiss you since September,” he admits. One of his eyes is closed, and he’s looking at her through one eye as if he is trying to hide. “I’ve had a crush on you since October. I wanted to date you since November. And I’ve been trying to convince myself to forget about you since I learned you liked someone else. But now that everything’s said and done, let me just say this—because I need to get it off my chest.”

He waits for her to respond, giving her a sly look. Shireen nods, wondering what else he could possibly say that would be new information after all of that. Rickon stretches back to his full height in front of her, his hands sliding over her thighs until they rest there. He’s searching her face for something, and when he finds it, he breathes out a long sigh. Then, he takes her hands gently, pressing them to his mouth.

“Shireen, I—”

“Hiding out in the bathroom, huh?”

Rickon jumps at the voice, taking a step away from her and dropping her hands. Her own heart is racing at the sudden intrusion, and the bubble has busted open. No longer are they secluded in their own private world of shared kisses and secrets, but they are back in the bathroom of a restaurant where she is only half-dressed and he is shying away from her to be modest. Remembering herself, she closes the shirt before working at the buttons to get it done up properly. Rickon takes a moment to recover before he sighs and says, “Fuck, Bran.”

“Sorry,” Bran says quickly. “Maybe I’ll just leave you here.”

Bran starts hobbling out of the room, and Rickon knows beyond a doubt that he is already the topic of rumor and that Bran is about to go confirm suspicions. He instinctively goes to stop his brother, before stopping himself because he can’t leave Shireen. Especially since he was going to _tell her_. Rickon rushes back to Shireen, holding her face in his hands and pecking her on the lips. She blinks at him.

“I’ll be right back,” he says quickly. “Promise. Just—I’ve gotta—” He gestures to the door before running out, managing to stop Bran just before he gets to the dining floor. He grabs his brother by the shoulder and pulls him around roughly to make himself clear. “Don’t you dare tell them.”

Bran gives him an innocent smile. “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he says sweetly. “I didn’t see anything.”

“Bullshit,” Rickon replies. He’s considering grabbing Bran by the collar to make the threat clear.

“No one’s going to be surprised, Rickon,” Bran tells him. “I mean, if you’d seen the looks that passed between you two…”

“Just—” Rickon isn’t sure what he’s planning on asking Bran, and he hesitates when all his thoughts come crashing together and the only thing left in his head is Shireen. He’s no longer listening to whatever it is Bran is saying, and he just wants to go back to her. He waves Bran off, seeing his brother shake his head before heading off. Then, Rickon walks back into the bathroom.

Shireen is no longer sitting on the countertop, his shirt has been tucked into the waistband of her skirt, bubbling out slightly, and she is struggling to roll up the sleeves. Rickon walks into her, completing the task easily. She smiles at him, but it falls quickly. “You really didn’t have to—”

Rickon kisses her quiet, though briefly. “You gave me permission, Shireen,” he says slowly. He kisses her again for good measure. Then, he pulls away to think through it. “I’ve been waiting for that for _months_. Though, I should probably ask every time.”

“No,” Shireen says firmly. She steps forward, pressing their chests together, and her eyes are burning with a look of pure _want_ for him. “Just kiss me. Whenever you want to.”

He does. Rickon wraps his arms around her, hugging her tight to him. Shireen slides her arms up around his neck, holding him close, and this time she is pressing her tongue forward, deepening their kiss. It is a sweet thing to have her here, and Rickon loves every moment of it, having her want him as much as he’s wanted her. It is a brief kiss, though Rickon is still buzzing from the taste of her on his mouth. They are both coy smiles and awkward hand holding when they finally head back to rejoin the rest of the world.


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Picset](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com/post/128119848611/study-buddies-chapter-15)

Somehow, Rickon makes it through the dinner and back to Skagos without any further questioning from his family. To be fair, Shireen also shied away some, keeping to herself and sneaking glances at him when no one was looking. Rickon isn’t sure how he managed to see his family off without trying to kiss her again, but the urge to do so is building up in his gut. Something has erupted in his stomach, and the quiet walk they spend together on the way back to the dorms is making him extremely nervous. Rickon is aware that he needs to talk to Shireen about what just happened, and he is also positive that he wants to kiss her again. However, every time he thinks about mentioning either, he is incapable of making sound.

It isn’t until they got to the hallway where they usually separate to their own rooms that the situation fully presents itself. Rickon resists the urge to reach out for her hand, biting his tongue hard. He sneaks a look over to Shireen, whose head is hung and who is twisting her hands together in front of her stomach. She is still wearing his shirt, and he is starting to think that it looks really nice on her.

“So,” she mumbles out. He turns to her, trying to keep casual while she speaks. “I, um… Would it be okay if I took a shower right now? I’m still a little sticky…”

Rickon blinks. That is not the question that has been pulling at the back of his mind. “Um, yeah, sure,” he says quickly, gesturing down the hall to his room. They take a few steps in silence before Rickon starts trying to force words out of his mouth. “So we, um, that is… I mean, I really… Fuck.”

Shireen giggles beside him, and her hand holds onto his softly. She is smiling at him when he looks back to her. “We kissed,” she says simply.

“Yeah, we did.” Rickon swallows, unsure what will happen next.

They take another few steps, and Rickon feels a physical ache in his stomach from the anticipation. Finally, Shireen says, “It was nice.”

“It was,” Rickon agrees. He pauses. They were still a few paces from his room, but he can’t last any longer. “Could we maybe do it again?”

In response, Shireen grips his hand tighter. Then, she leans up onto her tiptoes to kiss him lightly on the lips. He freezes, watching another smile cross her face before she keeps on to his room. He follows her in a daze, a part of him is unsure whether or not that actually happened. Fumbling with the lock, Rickon feels his heart pounding. He can’t figure out what he is supposed to do next, if there is anything for him to do next.

Shireen goes right in, heading over to the bathroom. With a flare of courage, Rickon grabs her by the wrist. He fights hard to keep his resolve. “Hey, um, Shir,” he starts. That is way too casual. He starts again. “ _Shireen_ , I—”

“I kind of like _Shir_ better,” she says, stepping into him. He instinctively takes a step back, but she keeps going. “Especially when you say it.”

Rickon swallows, digging deep for the bravery he once had around her. He grasps onto it like a lifeline. “What if I call you my girlfriend?”

Her face goes red, and she stops mid-step. The bright blue of her eyes is blown out by the whites of her eyes. Even though Rickon had been sure that she was flirting with him just a moment ago, everything feels up in the air again.

“You don’t have to if you don’t want to,” he sputters out quickly. The feelings in him drop and he runs his hands through his hair, looking down at the floor. “I just thought that maybe… I could… _we could_ … Fuck, I just really want to date you, Shireen.”

He lets a moment pass, and then he sneaks a look at her. Shireen is looking at him evenly. Her gaze is steady, though her eyes are a bit narrowed. Rickon’s mouth goes dry, and he can’t breathe anymore. The moment feels like it lasts forever until Shireen lets out a small. “Could I please be your girlfriend?”

“Really?” Rickon sucks in a sharp breath, trying to rationalize a world where Shireen would ask _him_ that question. Still, she nods and gives him a small smile.

Another moment passes, and Rickon realizes that they were both figuring it out. They are both realizing that they were dating now: that he is her boyfriend and she is his girlfriend. All the kisses mean something. They had just had their first kiss in a bathroom somewhere, but they need a first kiss now that they are dating. Together, they move toward each other, reaching out and bringing their bodies together.

Shireen sighs deeply against his mouth, kissing him firmly, all of the tentative nature from before forgotten. He lets her press them back into his bed, and he wraps his arms around her before he falls, taking her with him. There is a small bump when she pulls away, stopping their teeth from hitting too hard. It isn’t long before Rickon is cradling her head, rolling over her to kiss her deeply. Her hands stretch out at the base of his spine, her fingers only just moving below his waistband. She is pressing up into him, though. Her breasts a soft movement against his chest, and Rickon is sure that he is dreaming.

He’s had this dream before, too, but it was never as sweet as this. All of his imaginings would never have compared to the pure joy and contentment he feels now that her lips are on his. Then, she breathes out his name, and he is gone. There is nothing left of him anymore because this girl has just shattered his remains. He may be dead by her hands, but it is a sweet death, a fulfilling one.

Almost as a way to prove to his self that this is reality, Rickon moves away from her mouth. He kisses his way down her neck, and his hands wander even further south, finding her legs and skimming the hem of her skirt. His tongue is pressed to her throat and he wants to claim her, mark her as his. He chooses a spot just below her ear and begins sucking the skin there, though lightly. It takes a moment before Shireen pushes him away, and her hands fist into his shirt.

“Don’t you dare do anything I’m going to have to explain, got it?” she says firmly. Though there is fire in her eyes, there is also playfulness, so he kisses her back down to his bed, resting his body directly over hers. She lets out a small moan, and Rickon feels her hitching a leg up around his, pushing their pelvises together even though his pelvis is _not_ what she’s feeling now.

Her hand brushes up his back, taking his shirt with it part way. Then, he feels the tight pull from her gripping into his hair again. Shireen kisses him with all the passion and heat that he’s always wanted from her, and he does everything he can to kiss her back. They only pull away when they are both short of breath, her chest is heaving beneath his, and he feels the light press of her breasts every couple seconds. Her face is flushed, and her eyes are closed. Still, she smiles, giggling slightly.

“Maybe we shouldn’t have put that off,” she mumbles, rolling over to sit up. “To think I could have been kissing you for months.”

“You still can,” Rickon offers, leaning next to her and pressing kisses to her cheek. “I sure as hell don’t want to stop.”

Shireen pulls away, standing up. “I really do need to shower, though,” she says.

“Or…” Rickon stands up with her, reaching out for the buttons of his shirt and undoing them. He gets three undone before he adds on, “I could clean you up.”

Shireen gives him a small glare. “We only just started dating,” she says firmly. “You haven’t even taken me out on a date. You’re going to have to work harder to get me naked.”

He lets out an exaggerated groan, sitting back on his bed. “Fine,” he mumbles. “But what are those chances exactly?”

There’s another giggle before she kisses him lightly. Then, she pulls his shirt off in one clean motion. “I’d say they’re pretty good,” she says, laughing as she enters the bathroom.

Rickon would be lying if he said he was looking anywhere but at her breasts. The sight of her in a bra is burned into the back of his mind, and he thinks that _he_ is the one who needs a shower, though one of a completely different temperature and for completely different reasons. To pass the time, Rickon dresses for bed, and it is only when the water stops running that he realizes he’s never worn a shirt to bed before. The shirt hangs loosely from his hands for far too long before he tosses it aside. He’s still mostly dressed, but he’d only be willing to put his shirt back on if Shireen asked.

A few moments later, she steps out of the bathroom, and if Rickon’s jaw isn’t on the floor he’d be very surprised. Shireen appears to be dressed only in his button-down, and it isn’t buttoned up entirely. She takes a slow step forward, and he can see that she is definitely still wearing her underwear, though the length of his shirt gives his mind plenty of room to wander.

Shireen still feels nervous. A part of her brain wants to take everything slow with Rickon and have a proper, normal relationship for once in her life. However, there’s another part of her brain that’s telling her to just get everything over with because it won’t matter in a few weeks anyway. She swallows the thought, along with all the others just like them. Rickon is looking at her like she is actually _worth_ looking at, and for once in her life, she feels sexy, so she is riding the feeling out even if she never sees Rickon again after this night.

He appears to be frozen in place. Rickon hasn’t moved an inch since she stepped out of the bathroom, and he doesn’t seem to be able to any more. Shireen wants to tell him to stop gawking at her, but she _likes_ it. She genuinely enjoys seeing him this way, thinking that she has made him lose his senses from just looking at her, and her confidence grows the longer he stares.

When she slowly moves her hands up to undo the few buttons keeping the shirt together, he comes to again, jolting forward and stopping her hands. Though it looks like it’d be a sharp motion, his hands are gentle, and he keeps her calm the whole time.

“You don’t have to,” he starts slowly. His eyes have stopped meeting hers, and she feels she’s done something wrong. Maybe he won’t like her anymore once the day is through. He takes a deep breath and looks up to her. Shireen is thrown back by the pure emotions shining through his eyes. “I just want to make this clear: I don’t want to fuck you; I want to date you. Okay?”

Shireen narrows her eyes at him. The mood has shifted considerably, but this seems important to him, so she gives him a chance to explain.

“It’s just that… nothing could feel better than knowing I’m _yours_ ,” he clarifies. “And I want that feeling, not the weird masculine dominance of triumph from fucking some girl. I want to be yours, and if you wanted, I could make love to you, but that isn’t a priority. You are.”

His face has gone entirely red, and it is clear to Shireen that this is difficult for him. Rickon wants to set their boundaries clearly so they both know where they stand, and she appreciates it, but a part of her thinks it knows the reasons why he’s being so forward about it. “I’m not a priority, Rickon,” she says firmly. “For anyone. But that’s okay.”

She starts to open up his shirt again, but he stops her. “No, Shireen. You are my priority, okay? And I will love you until the end of my days if I can just be yours.”

This time, she freezes. Her heartbeat has slowed considerably, and she feels like she’s floating because _he may have actually just said that_. It is definitely too soon, and she has definitely never heard it before, so maybe her ears are playing tricks on her. Her mind is filling in the gaps with dreams that she’s had before. She shakes her head, hoping to clear the thought, but it lingers there picking and pulling until she is forced to ask, “You what?”

“I—” He seems to be catching himself now, erasing what he just said and trying to cover his tracks. She understands, but she won’t let it get to her. No matter how he goes about this, she is still into him, and she still wants whatever he’s willing to give. Shireen has resigned herself to these facts when Rickon takes her hands softly, tugging her closer. “I love you, Shireen,” he mumbles. “I’m in love with you.”

A swooping sensation rolls through her, and for a moment she thinks she will fall over. Surely, she is caught in a dream, still hazy from the shower, or perhaps still daydreaming while the water hits her. Then, she becomes hyper-aware of her surroundings. She is standing on a scratchy carpeted dorm room floor. She is only wearing his shirt over her underwear. Her hair is slowly drying over her shoulders and soaking the shirt in the process. And he loves her. She is stunned, and she is having a hard time processing the information.

Rickon’s face falls, and he licks his lips slowly. “It’s okay,” he whispers out. Her ears are straining to hear his voice, and she realizes that she has done something wrong. “You don’t have to feel the same, I just—”

“I do,” she blurts out. He blinks up at her. Then, his knees buckle and he falls to the bed. Shireen steps forward, placing her hands on his shoulders. “You talk way too much,” she says evenly, moving into him. “But I love you, too.”

With a slow press forward, her lips brush his before he responds, pushing up into her and holding her by the hips. She feels a shudder of relief run through him, ending in a sigh that ghosts through her mouth. Cocking her head further to the side, Shireen pushes him back, trying to find purchase on his bed and climbing up over him. Rickon lets her, scooting over to make room, holding her when she nearly falls and continuing to kiss her as if his life depends on it.

She feels weightless now, as if she has been suspended in time where nothing exists except for Rickon, and they are finally free to have each other, to be with each other. A small thought of _forever_ passes through her mind, and she laughs because the idea that used to scare her is comforting now. Rickon pulls back slightly, investigating the cause of her laughter.

“What’s so funny?” he asks, pecking the corner of her mouth.

Shireen giggles, latching onto another thought to share with him, something with less cause to scare him. “You have freckles,” she says. “And I never noticed.”

“Well, you’ve never been this close,” he replies. Rickon’s hands slip down her sides until they are back on her hips, and she rocks them forward. Immediately, his eyes go wide and his mouth falls open before he scrunches up his face and grits his teeth. “Bad idea,” he warns.

“You don’t want—”

He cuts her off with a laugh. “No, I do,” he clarifies. Then, he brushes his fingers through her hair. “Just… not yet.”

“Okay,” Shireen agrees. She shifts her weight to sit at his side, and they kiss again. Shireen is starting to think that each of their kisses are an event, that Rickon will make each kiss special and unique enough to sear deep into her memory. His hands are a nonstop exploration of her body, finding her legs and covering them, stretching her a bit so her can reach down to her toes and back to her hips.

The shirt doesn’t stay on much longer, and they roll down onto his bed together, neither of them willing to break the kiss. She isn’t sure how long it lasts. She knows that sometime later they end up under his blankets, cuddling up close to each other and kissing late into the night. Her heart is absolutely full of it, and he’s entirely unabashed about telling her he loves her between kisses.

Shireen also hadn’t anticipated how difficult it would be for two people to actually sleep together. Accounting for their arms made it quite difficult, but she eventually presses against his side, an arm tucked between them while her other is across his stomach. Rickon gives her one of his arms to use as a pillow, and he wraps her up against him. Now, he’s letting his hands drift lower and lower. It goes on like this until they both fall asleep, holding onto the other the best they can. Shireen can feel his heartbeat, steady as it is, and she is overjoyed that he is her lullaby.


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Picset](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com/post/128647350921/study-buddies-chapter-16)

The soft, grey light of the early morning wakes Shireen the next day. There is a comforting feeling where she is, and she feels as if she is being pulled back to sleep, drawn in by some force that is stronger than she will ever be. Shireen succumbs to it, letting herself settle back into her unconscious, back to the waves that pull her down deeper and threaten an easy death. She only just registers the feeling of someone touching her intimately. There is the soft prod of gentle fingers moving over her stomach. It pulls her in deeper, and she lets out a sigh.

The hands move, then: one finding her hip and tracing the curves there and the other curls up and presses between her breasts. Shireen comes to again, realizing that she is unclothed and someone is possessively holding on to her. She shrugs away from the touches, sitting up slightly before a soft moan comes from beside her. Turning to the sound, Shireen sees Rickon looking slightly annoyed in his haze of sleep.

“Come back to bed,” he mumbles. “It’s a Saturday…”

Shireen’s heart swells at hearing those words, knowing that they came from Rickon and that he wants her closer. Even though she is sure that she should be wearing more clothes, she goes back to her place, pressing her back to his chest. Rickon lets out a contented sigh. She feels the tug of her hair as he moves it away from her neck before his lips press to the skin there. This wakes him some, and she rolls over to see him.

He gives her a lazy grin before he leans over to kiss her full on the mouth. Then, everything clicks. She is in his room, in his bed, has spent the night with him, and they are dating now. She feels the smallest slip of his tongue in her mouth before he goes back to his spot. Rickon’s arms wrap around her, holding her tight against him. “Happy birthday,” he mumbles.

Confusion hits Shireen a moment before his words settle into her mind. Quickly, she sits up again, searching for her phone. Rickon lets out a small groan next to her as she checks the date, and he is right. She slumps down slightly until Rickon pulls her back again. He takes her phone away and puts it back on the dresser.

“None of that, Shir,” he says. She twists around until she is staring at his chest, then she looks up at him. He still looks mostly sleepy, but he has a small smile on his face. “You’re going to think too much about it and realize that this is illegal.”

“What?” she asks, taken aback by his words.

Rickon groans, propping himself onto an elbow to get a good look at her. “I’m a child,” he says slowly. “Underage, or whatever. And you’re an adult now.”

“That doesn’t mean it’s illegal,” Shireen says slowly.

“It is if we ever fuck,” Rickon mutters.

Shireen feels her face turning scarlet, and she hides it by tucking into his ribs. He lets out a small laugh above her, catching her curiosity just enough to make her look up. He still has the same childish grin on his face, and he looks happier than she’s ever seen him. Smiling back at him, she rolls onto her back, dragging up his sheet to keep herself covered. His eyes flick down to watch the movement before looking back to her eyes.

“So what do you want for your birthday?” he asks.

During the short time Shireen spends thinking about it, he’s already started bracing himself on his forearms around her, kissing his way across her shoulders and drawing patterns over her skin with his tongue. Shireen is dizzy from the attentions, light-headed from the knowledge that he’s doing it of his own accord, and she feels like she’s going to start pressing back into him, letting out noises to spur him on. On one particularly low sweep of his tongue between her breasts, Shireen’s eyes roll back. “Oh, _fuck_.”

“Not yet, dear,” Rickon replies. He doesn’t stop his tongue, though, and he’s getting closer to the edge of her bra as he goes. His hands gently pull down the sheet, and his nails are scraping over her ribs.

“Rickon…” Shireen moans. Her head is thrown back and her hands are tight fists in his sheets. She’s never had anyone pay such close attention to her, and she feels like she needs to pay him back somehow.

Rickon moves back up to kiss her mouth, and she uses the opportunity to slide her hand under the waistband of his pajama pants, circling his hips and seeking him out. He sits back, moving away from her. “No, honey,” he says sweetly, grabbing her hands away from him. Then, he leans down and pecks her on the lips. “Today is your birthday. Today is all about _you_ , Shir.”

The way he’s talking is driving her mad, making heat build in her stomach and between her legs. Shireen briefly fears that she is just imagining this—that she’ll never really have him, but her mind goes blank when he kisses her again. His hands trace over the band of her bra, and she can’t breathe, let alone respond when he asks to take it off. Instead, she just nods frantically, letting him expose her and feast his eyes on her before his mouth follows suit. Shireen’s breathing becomes short and ragged, never had she known the little effort needed to make her gasp and moan, but Rickon seems to know exactly where to place his mouth.

Rickon manages to move her up the bed and place his fingers around the elastic of her underwear before she realizes what his aim is. She feels the blush creep onto her face and asks, “What are you doing?”

He gives her a small smile. “You’ve only ever given me two pieces of advice,” he starts slowly. His hands stop their mission of undressing her, and he rubs them over her legs. “You told me that I needed to let my girlfriend finish before I do, and that if I wanted to finger someone, I should use my tongue. And that is _exactly_ what I’m going to do.”

\--

It is a wonder that they even manage to leave his room that day. Rickon had been content to stay in bed all day working Shireen over and over again. Making her moan is worth the time it takes, even if his jaw and tongue are still sore from the effort. After she came a number of times, Shireen finally stopped him, claiming that she needed a break from it, which caused him to laugh heartily while she showered and it caused her to punch him in the shoulder when he was still laughing when she exited. He made it up to her by kissing her again, and then he provided her a shirt to wear before they left to seek out real food.

“Hey, guess what?” Rickon asks. He releases her hand in favor of slinging his arm over her shoulders.

Shireen’s hand goes across his back and settles on his hip, but she just hums out a response.

Rickon almost laughs at that, too, before he thinks better of it. Instead, he says, “You’re my girlfriend.”

He is positive that Shireen is rolling her eyes at him, but he can’t see because she is too close to him, pressed against his chest. Rickon lets a grin settle on his face, happy that the issue with not being able to see her is because she’s too close, rather than too far. Wrapping his arms around her, Rickon presses a kiss to her temple and she lets out a small squeal.

“I can’t see when you put my hair in front my face!” she says, moving away from him.

“Sorry, sorry,” Rickon says quickly, pulling her back and kissing her on the mouth. Shireen huffs gently into his mouth, and he moves them back into position for walking. They are headed to her dorm, where she’s going to get actual clothes to change into and then they’ll go get food.

They round the corner to the hallway in question and they both freeze. Several people are crowded around the door of her room, carrying massive cameras, and they are very obviously waiting for someone to leave the room. Or enter.

“That fucking bastard,” Shireen mumbles. Rickon stiffens, tucking her further into his side. Making sure that she won’t be recognized, he leads her past them, keeping their conversation minimal.

The crowd of photographers parts for them before one of them shouts, “Hey! You go here?”

“What?” Rickon replies, trying to act normal. As if seeing a crowd of photographers at this stupid reform school was normal. “Yeah, I go here.”

The reporter walks up to him, holding out a twenty dollar bill in the cross of his arm. “Can I ask you a question, kid?” He wiggles the bill out a bit.

Rickon glances down at Shireen, making sure she’s still covered before taking it. “Sure.”

“Ever heard of a girl called Shireen Baratheon? We got word that she’s here.”

Rickon quickly makes a face, hoping that he just looks confused. “Who the fuck is Shireen Baratheon?”

The reporter leans back against the wall. “Supposedly, a senator’s daughter,” he say. “Been in hiding for years, but we’ve never got word of her before. Just got a lead from some Storm kid, says he dated her here.”

“That Storm kid is probably the biggest liar at this school,” Rickon says. Then, he looks down at Shireen as says, “Right, honey?”

“I’ll say,” Shireen says, her voice a bit small.

The reporter groans and tosses his head back. “Figures,” he says. “We’ll just have to wait out the day and see if it’s true or not.”

“Have fun,” Rickon replies casually. He quickly walks Shireen out into the warm spring air. Shushing her before she can say anything, he leads them straight to the principal’s office. Shireen has started to shake against his side, but she doesn’t move until they’re completely inside the room.

Shireen explodes into a ball of fury the moment Osha asks her to talk. “That fucking asshole!” she yells. “Fuck, I should have murdered him.”

Rickon winces. That would be cause for expulsion had it come out of his mouth. However, Osha looks unconcerned with the screaming. She’s sitting patiently at her desk, digging out files and flicking through them. Shireen is now pacing the room, and Rickon’s given up hope at reeling her in. He flops down into a chair across from Osha and gives her a pleading look.

“What happened, exactly?” Osha asks him, looking up from the files.

“Edric Storm told people that Shireen is here,” Rickon tell Osha. “There are reporters in the hallways and probably stationed all around campus. They want to know if it’s true that a senator has been hiding a daughter.”

Shireen is pulling at her hair now, still pacing and looking more furious than ever. Rickon was finding it hard to believe that just an hour ago she’d been utterly relaxed against his pillows. He quickly shakes the thought from his head, hoping that his face isn’t red from the memory. To distract himself, he reaches out for Shireen and pulls her into his lap. She’s still breathing heavily, and she hasn’t settled at all. Her brow seems to be permanently knitted, and she’s frowning hard.

“We’ll have to send her off,” Osha says, opening up a file. She’s all business now, quickly searching through for the necessary papers until she finds them. “There are plans in case something happened… But we require your permission now, Miss Baratheon.”

“What?” Shireen asks. Some of the tension leaves her at those words, but her arms are still crossed.

Osha sighs, rounding her desk to present Shireen with the paperwork. “You’re an adult now,” she tells her. “You no longer have to cooperate. If you so wished, you could go spill everything on your father.”

“I—oh…” Shireen slumps into Rickon’s chest, grabbing at the papers and reading through them. She sucks in a breath before she throws them to the ground. Then, she meets Osha’s gaze with a heavy glare. “No.”

“I thought so,” Osha replies, not bothering with the papers on the floor. She’s digging through another file now, and Rickon’s tempted to ask what the papers were about. Shireen looks angry, though, so he lets it go. Finally, Osha looks up. “Edric will be expelled, as expected, and I will send security to rid the current infestation. You will kindly ask your roommate to maintain her end of the non-disclosure agreement, and we’ll find another way to get you out.”

“You can do that?” Rickon asks. Suddenly, it seems that Skagos may have been the best place for Shireen to end up.

Osha shakes her head at Rickon. “ _I_ can’t,” she corrects. “But you can.”

Rickon scrunches up his face in confusion, trying to reason out what she’s saying. Even Shireen gives him a curious look, obviously hoping for some sort of out. Finally, it hits him. “Oh!” he exclaims. Then, he removes Shireen from his lap, giving himself better access to his phone. Quickly, he dials a number. Shireen’s face is slowly morphing into that of worry. Then, the line is answered. “Dad! We need help.”

Stumbling over his words just slightly, Rickon explains the situation, cutting across all the questions his dad is bound to ask. They get through to the plan fast enough: someone is coming to take Shireen to the Stark house, someone else will pick up Rickon tomorrow, and all their belongings will be sent over or retrieved as soon as access to both rooms won’t be questioned. Rickon relays the plan to Osha and Shireen, before hanging up with his dad.

“You know, he’s going to ask questions, too,” Rickon tells Shireen.

Shireen heaves out a sigh, crossing her arms again. “At least, he won’t tell the entire country if I ask him not to.”

Rickon gives her a light shrug at this, not bothering to press the point. Either way, they were about to be separated, and a tight knot was building in his chest at not being allowed to stay near her. Shireen seems to sense his nerves, telling him that everything will be fine and giving him a tight hug. Just before leaving the room, Osha gives Rickon a knowing look and says, “Dating now?”

Rickon rolls his eyes at his counselor, reaching out for Shireen’s hand. “Fuck off, Osha,” he says sharply. Then, Osha leads them to a delivery bay, where the arrival and departure of odd cars won’t be questioned. Shireen moves into his side as she had been before, hiding her face from any onlookers. There’s a painful feeling in Rickon’s chest knowing that he is hiding her from the world and that she’s hating every minute of being kept away. It hurts him more to know that he can’t go with her today, that leaving the school could arouse more suspicions. He really wants to go, though.

By the time the car arrives to take Shireen away, she is nearly back to normal. She looks a little defeated, angry at not being in control of her life. Before she even greets the driver, she gives Rickon a tight hug and mutters out, “I love you.”

“I love you, too,” Rickon replies. He kisses her cheek for good measure. Shireen looks at him expectantly, obviously wanting a more proper kiss, but Rickon just laughs and rubs a thumb over her pendant. “I’m right here, Shireen.”

“Because you gave it to me?” she questions, pouting slightly.

“Because a direwolf is the symbol of house Stark,” Rickon corrects. Shireen’s mouth opens slightly, and he uses the time to kiss her again. “I’ve already given you part of myself. And I’m just going to keep giving you more.”

Shireen grabs at his jaw roughly, forcing him to kiss her fully. He laughs against her mouth before returning the kiss, hugging her tight in the process. “You asshole,” she says. One of her hands is lightly tracing the pendant, and Rickon notices that the chain is twisted. He fixes it while Shireen stares at him. “Do me a favor and kick Edric in the balls before you leave.”

“That is such a woman’s tactic,” Rickon says, shaking his head at her. He suppresses a wince at the thought of the pain. Then, he looks up to see a familiar face watching them. “Hey, Jory.”

“Rickon,” he greets. “I think you’re making out with my cargo.”

“She’s a fucking human, not some cargo,” Rickon shoots back. He turns sharply to Shireen. “If he tries anything funny, feel free to kick _him_ in the balls.”

Shireen laughs, stretching up to get another kiss. “I’ll see you soon,” she tells him. Then, she kisses him once more before pulling away and entering the open door of the car. 

Rickon watches her go with a tight feeling in his chest. He knows that she’ll be better off with better protection. He knows that his father will take care of her and settle all the matters. And he knows that Edric Storm is not going to be happy when they run into each other later.


	17. Chapter 17

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Picset](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com/post/129157186641/study-buddies-chapter-17)

The past few hours of Shireen’s life have been the most stressful of her life. She had always been content to live in the shadows, even believed that it suited her. There has never been any reason for her to make a spectacle of herself or appear in newspapers and magazines like her cousins. She had accepted her parents’ reasoning of not wanting her life to be more difficult before they started the loud, late-night arguments about how difficult she made life for them. If anything, they just made her fall deeper into herself, giving her a genuine rationale to fight against authority. There was never anything deeper than that, nothing had ever threatened to attack her directly until now.

Now, she has somehow been bold enough to allow someone to know her well enough, and they are out to hurt her. She can’t see a way that any of this will end well. There is no way for her to get out of this safely without someone finding a way to attack her or her family. 

Shireen slowly just lets the outcome sink in. Her father will figure out soon enough, and it will be entirely blamed on her. The car ride passes in near silence. Jory Cassel seems friendly enough, but he notices how withdrawn she is, he lets the conversation drop.

She can’t even find it in herself to be excited about going back to Winterfell. While she has been excited about going back for the past few weeks, she is now dreading everything that will happen when she got there.

The Starks are more concerned about her than anything. Catelyn immediately takes her into the kitchen, giving her food and snacks as soon as she gets in the house. Ned disappears into his study with Jory, and it isn’t until after she finishes her meal that they ask her when she wants to go over everything with them. She begrudgingly agrees to do it soon, though she doesn’t realize that they mean _everything_.

With a deep sigh, Shireen sinks into the couch. Catelyn takes a seat beside her and places an arm over her shoulders. Feeling conflicted about the maternal comfort, Shireen slowly tells them everything she knows.

“And no one else would have tried to do this?” Ned asks. He looks over the notes he took, still making marks over the papers.

Shireen still felt a thick bundle of nerves in her stomach. She squirms about in her seat, trying to dig herself in deeper. As it is, she has her knees folded in front of her, and she holds onto her legs tightly. “No, it was definitely Edric,” she says. “One of the reporters told us…”

“And there’s no evidence that you were actually anywhere else but Skagos?” Ned asks. “No other facility has your name?”

Wincing a bit at the _facility_ , she shakes her head. “Not that I know of,” she replies, slumping down. “I wasn’t allowed to use my real name until Skagos, and I had to beg my father to let me, and he forced my roommate and other parties to sign non-disclosure agreements.”

“She’s noticeable, though,” Jory adds. “I’m sure with a little questioning they can get the information out. Depends on how thorough they are.”

“Yes, Jory,” Ned says, finally placing down his papers. Then, he leans over the table to actually look at her. “Now, I’ll need to clear up some things with _involved parties_ , but we should be able to give you plenty of options to get you through this. But how are you doing?”

Shireen glances around. She’s still shocked that anyone would be so concerned for her. Thinking back to Rickon, she hugs herself tighter. _He_ would be here for her. He would definitely be comforting her and distracting her as much as he could. It occurs to her through all of this that she isn’t missing Rickon, her boyfriend of less than twenty-fours; she is missing her best friend. Hugging her knees tighter to her chest, she just mumbles out, “When’s Rickon getting here?”

“Tomorrow afternoon,” Catelyn tells her. Then, she turns sharply to her husband. “She needs to rest now, dear.”

“Very well,” Ned says. He stands up and goes to give Catelyn a kiss. “I have a few calls to make before bed. Everything needs to be settled in the next day.”

Nodding, Shireen finally stands up. “Thank you so much for all of this,” she says softly. “I know you don’t have to, and—”

“Nonsense,” Catelyn scolds. “Now, you stop worrying about us and get to bed. You can have the same room from your last visit.”

Murmuring out another thanks, Shireen climbs to the second floor. She stops on the landing, looking around. The house feels oddly empty without the other Stark children here, and she desperately doesn’t want to be alone tonight. Glancing around, she sneaks into Rickon’s room and shuts the door behind her. Sighing, she walks through his room, loving how it feels like him regardless of him not being here. Hopping onto his bed, she digs through his drawers until she finds a shirt that fits her like a dress and wears that to bed. There’s a long time where she just rests in his sheets, trying to imagine what it would be like if he was here. She misses him, and she resolves to sleep in as much as possible so she can wake closer to his arrival.

\--

There’s a cool breeze outside by the time Rickon gets back home. Despite summer approaching quickly, he’s cold. Rickon knows that this is mostly because he’s had an ice pack pressed to his face on and off for the last three hours, but he knows that he’ll see Shireen soon and that makes it worth it. He’s tolerated the ride back home in the backseat of Arya’s car, listening to her complaining to Gendry about the long drive she had to take because Rickon got expelled again. He isn’t even in the mood to tell her off, to let her know that it was all a trick to get him out of school without arousing suspicion. Instead, he just stares out the window, checking his phone every two minutes for some sort of response from Shireen.

“So I guess this means you can’t actually date that girl, huh?” Arya asks. Her legs are up on the dashboard, her toes bouncing back and forth to the beat of the music. Gendry gave up on trying to make her sit properly hours ago, and he looks over his shoulder to give Rickon a quick glance.

Rickon just shrugs, not bothering to give her a response.

Gendry relays this information to Arya. “He just shrugged.”

“And _you’re_ supposed to be focused on driving,” Arya says. She reaches over to punch his shoulder.

“Would you—” Gendry cuts himself off in his attempt to fend off her attacks.

Rickon watches them with mild amusement, letting them distract him from the issues at hand. For the rest of the ride, Arya and Gendry seem to be arguing more than anything, though both of them laugh through most of it. Though they are hours ahead of schedule, it’s later in the morning than Rickon would like when they get home.

He bolts out of the car, even before the car is off. Arya yells something after him (probably about closing the car door), but he ignores her in search of Shireen. Before he gets too deep in the house, he nearly crashes into his mother.

“Where’s Shireen?” he asks immediately.

“It’s good to see you, too,” Catelyn says in return. She gives him a slightly stern look, but his determination doesn’t change. “She’s still sleeping. She hasn’t come down yet.”

“Oh,” Rickon mumbles, deflating a little. Then, he gives his mom a hug. “Hi, Mom.”

His mother returns the hug, patting his back a few times. She tugs him toward the kitchen. “Let me make you some breakfast.”

Just as they get into the kitchen, Arya and Gendry finally get in. There’s a loud _THUNK_ from the front door. Catelyn turns from the stove to examine the noise. Before she can ask anything, Arya shouts, “Thanks for helping us with all your crap, Rickon!”

“You’re welcome!” he calls back. With a small glare from his mother, he shies out of the kitchen to go clear the doorway. Arya is still kicking some of his things around, and he shoos her away before sorting through the bags and carrying them upstairs. He trudges into his room and shoves the door open. It isn’t until after he’s dropped the first set of luggage that he notices someone in his bed.

He sucks in a sharp breath, watching as Shireen rolls over, facing him now. She still appears to be completely asleep. He sees her squirm a bit as she sleeps, so he goes over and sits on the edge of the bed. Rickon briefly considers waking her, but he knows she’s been through a lot in the past twenty-fours. He contents himself with kissing her forehead before leaving to move the remainder of the bags. The rest of the trips are taken with much more caution, and he leaves the bags outside of his room instead of inside.

Jumping back down the stairs, Rickon heads into the kitchen, taking a plate of food from his mom. He accepts the food with a smile, sitting down next to Arya to eat. Arya rolls her eyes at him, looking pointedly at their mom.

“So Rickon gets to be treated nicely even after I have to drive for hours to pick his ass up after getting expelled?” she asks.

“ _You_ didn’t do any driving,” Gendry points out, flicking her arm.

Arya and Gendry quickly get into another small argument, so Catelyn ignores them, taking a plate of food to their father’s study. During that time, Rickon finishes up his breakfast, taking his plate back to the kitchen. Ned came out of his study with Catelyn in tow, the two of them speaking in low tones to each other. Arya immediately starts questioning them about Rickon and his presence here. Rickon watches them for a moment, thinking about sneaking away and into his bed with Shireen.

When he glances up to finally make his escape, he sees Shireen standing in the hallway, looking a little lost and disgruntled. She’s wearing one of his old shirts and sweatpants, both of which fit her poorly. Shireen looks around for a bit, blinking slowly before she notices him.

“Hey,” he mumbles, stepping toward her slowly.

She seems to wake up instantly, and her eyes go wide. Then, she runs at him. “Rickon!” Shireen’s arms hook around his neck and she kisses him dead on, obviously unaware of his family in the next room.

Rickon forgets his family, too, wrapping his arms around her and hugging her tightly against him. He pulls away gently, keeping her locked against his body. Shireen buries her face in his neck, refusing to let go of him. She’s only just standing on her tiptoes, and she slumps just slightly against him.

“I missed you,” she mumbles. Finally, she moves away, fully looking at him. He watches her eyes zigzag as she looks around his face, and she slowly starts frowning. Then, she starts looking annoyed. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

He laughs, settling against the counter and loosening his grip on her. “You should see the other guys,” he says, playing at casual.

“ _Guys_?” she questions. “As in plural?”

“Yup,” Rickon says. He takes a deep breath, looking over at Shireen. Her eyebrows are now raised, and she crosses her arms at him. She wants answers. Rickon just slumps down, huffing out a breath. “You told me to kick him in the balls.”

“Rickon!” Catelyn calls from the other room.

“She did!” he calls back. He looks over at his mom, feeling only a little exasperated.

Arya’s looking at him with an amused expression on her face, though Gendry seems unconcerned with the events. His parents were both looking over, both with small smiles on their faces. Rickon feels a small blush growing on his face, so he looks back to Shireen. She softens some, reaching out to trace the bruises on his face. Then, she sighs.

“You should at least put ice on it,” she mumbles, walking around him toward the refrigerator.

Rickon snags her wrist as she tries to go past. He turns her back into his chest. “I’m still freezing from the ice that’s been there,” he tells her. “But I do know where some of your clothes are. Come on.”

He leads her away from the kitchen before anyone can interrupt them. Once they are in the hallway, Shireen jumps up to kiss him again. Rickon stumbles a bit, feeling her entire weight against him. Grabbing her legs, he lifts her into his arms and carries her upstairs. He nearly tosses her onto the bed when she squeals loudly and clutches onto him harder.

“Don’t you dare!” she yells. Her grip on him is tight enough that he thinks she might choke him. 

He thanks her for screaming, though, knowing that his family will be put-off from checking on them if they think she’s yelling at him. With a much gentler touch, he sets her down, though she still looks infuriated with him. After kissing her again, he brings all the bags into the room, letting her look through her clothes while he lounges on his bed.

“So you went after Edric?” Shireen asks. She’s digging through one of the prepared suitcases of her clothes, frowning at most of the things in there.

Rickon slides forward, looking over her shoulder at her clothes. “You told me to,” he explains. “I went straight for the bastard. I got in one good punch before he sent his friends on me. Think I broke his nose, though…”

Shireen turns to him with a grin, stretching from her place on the floor to kiss him. He leans into her, balancing a hand on the floor to lean over more. She grins against his mouth, reaching up to steady him and hold him against her. He slips against her a bit and nearly falls off the bed.

“Shit,” he mutters.

Laughing, Shireen runs a hand through his hair, ruffling it a bit. He gives her a wide smile before he completely falls out of bed. A small gasp leaves Shireen before she starts laughing again, watching Rickon rub at the back of his head. This is exactly what she was hoping for: having his carefree, childish nature back, balancing out all the seriousness of her life. He adjusts himself slightly, using her lap as a pillow and reaching around to hold her waist. She pats his cheek a bit before going back to digging through her clothes. After a while, she finally pulls out an outfit, tapping Rickon to make him move. He does after receiving another kiss from her.

Brushing her hair behind her ear, she leaves to the bathroom to dress quickly before jumping back onto his bed. He pulls her down and hugs her again, holding her for a bit before he pulls away and asks, “So is everything okay?”

Shireen nods. “Yeah, your dad’s figuring everything out for me,” she tells him. 

He hugs her again, kissing her forehead before sitting up. “I guess we should go deal with that,” he says, faking a groan and pulling her out of the room.

They join up with the rest of the Starks in the dining room. Rickon stays at her side, his hands almost always in her hair or holding her hands. While his attention doesn’t seem to be on the conversation, she’s attentive to all the plans Ned is placing in front of her. He gives her a comprehensive list of the three options for her to take now, and she honestly hates all of them. They all involve her parents far too much for her to want any of them. She’s thinking of a way to tell Ned this when Gendry walks in from the kitchen, sipping at his coffee.

“There is another option,” Gendry announces.

Shireen snaps her attention to him. At this point, she’ll take anything that doesn’t involve going back to do publicity with her parents, legally changing her name, or pretending she was someone else for the rest of her life. “What is it?” she asks.

Gendry takes another sip of his coffee while Ned turns to face him. “You could be my sister,” he says. “I mean, I’m technically Baratheon myself.”

“You—what?” Shireen sputters out. Finally, she looks at Gendry, forcing herself to notice the similarities between him and the rest of her family. He has the same eye color, the same hair, and he bears a striking resemblance to her uncle.

“Then, she’d be Robert’s,” Ned says, shaking his head. “It wouldn’t work.”

Arya furrows her brows. “Yes, it would,” she says slowly. “Gendry’s a Waters; he took his mom’s last name. If she just goes around as his sister, everything clicks into place. She’s just like us now: regular people.”

“Everyone thinks she’s normal because she is,” Rickon mutters. He’s tracing the line of her shoulder, and there’s a small smile on his face.

“We’d just have to convince Stannis to agree that he doesn’t have a daughter,” Ned says slowly, scribbling out a new outline for this plan.

Shireen scoffs loudly. “He doesn’t as far as he’s concerned,” she says. “They’ve been trying to get rid of me for years.”

Ned stands up, then, collecting his papers. “I’ll go make the necessary calls, then,” he says. He leaves the room in favor of his study, and Gendry follows him out. Arya trails after them, obviously intent on eavesdropping. Shireen looks after them until Rickon tugs at her sleeve.

“Good plan?” he asks.

She nods. “But I didn’t realize… Gendry’s my cousin?”

Rickon laughs. “I guess so. I don’t think he likes being Baratheon too much, though.”

“I’m not liking it too much either,” Shireen mutters. She leans over to rest her head on his shoulder. He wraps his arms around her, keeping her tucked in to his chest. Shireen looks up, her fingers lightly tracing over his chest. “Sorry for pulling you out of school.”

With a laugh, Rickon tilts her chin up. “Unfortunately, you haven’t done that,” he says. “Osha’s sending over the rest of our homework for the year so we can both officially finish.”

He leads her away from the kitchen and into the living room, turning on the television. They move into each other, leaning down across the sofa. Shireen steals the remote, flipping through the channels just because she can. She hums to herself, letting Rickon just hold her as they spend the afternoon together. Rickon’s drifting to sleep behind her when Gendry finds them there on the couch.

“Am I going to have to give him a talk?” Gendry asks. He sits in a recliner, leaning back and leveling a look at them.

With a small smile, Shireen sits up. She points the remote at him and says, “Not before we do, cousin.”


	18. Chapter 18

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Picset](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com/post/129647115411/study-buddies-chapter-18)

For the next day, Rickon watches Shireen follow Gendry around like a baby chick. She won’t stop asking him questions about every detail of his life, and Rickon makes an attempt to pull her away occasionally, but she always moves away quickly to pester Gendry some more. Leaving her to get to know her cousin, he joins Arya in watching them. She looks moderately annoyed, but she’s grinning the entire time. Popping a chip into his mouth, he chews through the bite and elbows Arya. She turns to him quickly, looking a little confused.

“Why’re you smiling so much?” Rickon asks. He holds out the bowl of chips to his sister. “Gendry looks super annoyed.”

Arya grabs a small handful, picking through the chips and crunching one between her teeth. She reaches out blindly for her glass of water and gulps it down. Turning back to Gendry, she grins again. Shireen is leaning over the back of the couch, her arms dangling loosely in his direction. Gendry walks around the couch slowly, sitting down on the other side. Shireen turns toward him, continuing to ask questions.

“He’s always wanted a sibling,” Arya mutters, watching them. She turns to Rickon and punches his shoulder. “So you’re lucky.”

“Fuck off, Arya,” Rickon mutters, swiping her hands away. 

She shoves her chips into her mouth and moves to attack him again. Rickon dodges her blows, running around the island of the kitchen. Arya chases after him and they run around the kitchen and through most of the house, weaving around their parents and dodging the furniture. Rickon carefully slides the bowl of chips on a random table as he runs, ending up in the living room and skidding to a halt behind Shireen. Arya bursts into the room at full speed, but Gendry catches her about the waist to make her stop.

“Behave yourselves!” Catelyn calls from down the hall. She enters the room a short while later, the bowl of chips resting on her forearm.

“Rickon started it!” Arya yells, sticking her tongue out at her brother and struggling to get out of Gendry’s grasp. He lets out a small grunt as he shifts his arms around, locking her in place.

“Did not!” Rickon calls back, only sitting up slightly from his place behind Shireen. He leans over onto her, resting his chin on her shoulder.

Catelyn breathes out a heavy sigh, walking just far enough into the room to place the bowl of chips on the coffee table. She sends reprimanding looks at both of her children before looking between Gendry and Shireen. “Keep yourselves behaved,” she says firmly. “The Barartheons are coming over, and they’re flying out for the trip so please behave yourselves around them.”

“Wait, what?” Shireen sits up, knocking Rickon’s teeth together with the sharp movement. She reaches back blindly to rub his leg, but tension is still roiling through her body. Her parents can’t possibly have agreed to actually fly out to Winterfell for this. A lump forms in the back of her throat, and she feels like she may choke on the news. Swallowing hard, Shireen steels herself. “Not here?”

“Yes, here,” Catelyn says, giving Shireen a sympathetic look. She moves around the couch to take a seat next to Shireen, placing a gentle hand over hers. “It was the only way to get any form of cooperation from them. Giving the benefits to both parties, I think the visit should be short.”

Nodding, Shireen’s eyes go downcast. She’s staring at a spot on her lap, not really seeing what’s there because images of what her parents will do are running through her mind. Instead of just being allowed to rest on the back burner her whole life, she’s now being pulled into their center of attention, and there is no way that she’s ready for it. Still, she can’t stop nodding, and she feels stressed out just from thinking about it. A distant part of her brain registers that people are talking around her, but she feels so separated from it that she just curls in on herself.

Even though she can feel herself falling deeper into herself, she tries to hold herself steady. There’s a small tug on her arm when Rickon draws her out, moving her into his lap and hugging her close. He’s murmuring something under his breath, but she doesn’t hear anything. Shireen just turns into his chest, hiding away from the world and getting lost in him instead of herself. She wraps her arms tight around him, feeling the smooth expanse of his back and the small give of his relaxed muscle. He fills her up, though, holding her together and keeping her safe. A shaking breath leaves her, and she finally glances up at him.

Rickon is looking down at her, ready to meet her gaze with all the warmth and kindness that he always offers. A wave of calm washes over her, and a small smile crosses his face. He hugs her tighter before giving her more space. “You okay?”

Shireen nods, and Rickon nearly snorts. He gives her an amused look, and she’s a bit confused at his response.

“You’ve been nodding on autopilot for a while,” he tells her. “I’m serious, Shir. Are you okay?”

Shireen takes a deep breath in before exhaling slowly. “I’m okay,” she says. “I don’t want to see my parents again. I wanted to be done with them. I wasn’t even going to go back after Skagos… I just… It’s going to be awful.”

“You don’t have to be there,” Rickon says softly. “I’ll make my dad deal with it if you want.”

Shaking her head, Shireen sits back slightly, her palms resting lightly on his chest. “No, I made the problem. I should fix it,” she says firmly. “It’s my fault that Edric—”

“It is not your fault that he’s an asshole,” Rickon says sharply. “Fucking bastard… I should have done him in sooner.”

“Ric, it’s fine,” Shireen says gently. “I’ll deal with it.”

He pulls her in for another kiss, holding her against his chest. They stay there a long while until they hear a bunch of shuffling outside. Rickon frowns, looking off to the side even though a sofa is blocking his view. It isn’t until footsteps loudly start moving around the house that he sits up, looking over the top of the sofa. Shireen stands slowly, brushing her shirt into place and combing through her hair with her fingers. There are a few tangles that she takes the time to comb out, until Rickon taps her wrist.

“Hey,” he says. There’s a slight reddish tinge on his cheeks. He looks up through his eyelashes at her. “I love you.”

Shireen leans down over the sofa to kiss him, and he holds her against him for a bit longer than would be appropriate. She pulls away from him with a smile and says, “I love you, too” before a loud commotion comes from the front hall. She lets out another sigh as she eases her way into the room.

“Hello, Mr. and Mrs. Baratheon,” Catelyn greets cordially, inviting them into the house. “Please, come in.”

“Ms. Florent,” Selyse corrects quickly. “The divorce is final.”

Shireen feels a flare of anger at her parents, knowing that they probably celebrated her eighteenth birthday with a hearty divorce. She crosses her arms and tries not to be peeved with their behavior. Making no effort to push herself into the conversation, she lets them carry on into the kitchen. They’re nearly in when Stannis notices her.

“Shireen,” he says shortly. She can’t read his expression at all. He’s the same blank slate he’s always been, still void of emotion and calculating.

“Stannis,” she says back, no longer bothered with acknowledging his relation to her.

His eyes narrow at the greeting, but he eventually moves into the kitchen. She lets out a breath as Ned passes her, squeezing her shoulder lightly before entering in front of her. Then, she follows in, not daring to meet anyone’s gaze. They all settle around the kitchen. Catelyn is providing drinks and effectively distracting her parents until they turn to the kitchen.

“What are you doing here?” comes the shrill voice of her mother.

Shireen’s eyes flick up, and she feels her mother’s glare burning into her. Hesitantly, she takes a step back, trying to remove herself physically.

“Shireen is our guest,” Ned says. “My son was concerned for her safety and asked that I step in. She is, of course, an adult and fully welcome to find her own means of safety.”

“She’s our daughter, and she should have come to us!” her mother shouts. She slams her drink on the island, nearly cracking the glass, and takes quick steps toward Shireen. Though she recoils, Selyse snags her wrist and wrenches her closer. “I bet she’s told everyone else as well!” 

Trying to twist her wrist away, Shireen lets out a small gasp of pain, shutting her eyes tight at the sensation. Another hand mingles with hers, prying her mother’s hand away. She hears Selyse let out a small sound of pain before she looks up and sees Rickon standing between them. He’s outwardly furious, and she sees Catelyn nod in agreement with his actions. Turning toward her, his eyes flicker back to the calm expression before he lifts her into his arms and says, “Come, dear. We have other things to do.”

He walks her out of the room. Shireen sneaks a glance behind them to see her mother looking absolutely livid, but her father appears to be rounding on her mother. She holds onto Rickon’s neck as he starts climbing the stairs again. She feels infinitely calmer in his arms, so she digs her nose into his neck, breathing in deeply. He chuckles lightly, and she feels the shift in his weight when he sits on the edge of his bed.

Rickon leans back slightly, dragging his fingers through her hair. He has an expression of concern on his face, watching her carefully. “I know I’ve mentioned it before,” he starts slowly, “but I really don’t like your parents.”

“I don’t really like them either,” she admits. “Not since they made it clear that I was inconvenient for them…”

Rickon shrugs gently, hugging her and pulling her down onto his bed. “More for me,” he says with a grin, kissing her scars several times.

Before long, she starts giggling, moving closer into him as they rest together. They don’t do much in his room, mostly because she is still stressed from the knowledge that her parents are downstairs. Still, Rickon distracts her, pulling out things from his closet to show her. They get caught up playing several games of Mancala, and Shireen thinks that Rickon is intentionally bending the rules to let her win. She starts chucking her marbles at him in attempt to get him to play properly, and he confesses that he doesn’t actually know the rules. Laughing, Shireen tackles Rickon down on his bed. Stepping around the game board, she rests over him, kissing his chin. Then, she makes a face.

“What’s going to happen when you start growing a beard?” she asks.

Rickon shrugs, rolling them further away from the game, but effectively landing the both of them on a multitude of marbles. “Judging from my brother, people will start to realize how ginger I actually am.”

Shireen laughs, resting her head on his chest. They lay together for quite some time, the both of them looking out the window and commenting on some of the things they see and poking fun at each other. When a loud knock is heard, Shireen jumps up and away from the door, fixing her hair and clothes. Rickon stills her hands by taking them in his.

“Come in,” he says loudly. He squeezes her hand tighter.

To her great surprise (and mild horror), Stannis walks into the room. He is holding himself tall, his hands folded together in front of him, and he looks directly at them. Shireen realizes that the last place she wanted her father to find her was in some boy’s bed, but she refuses to cower in front of him now. Stannis stops a couple feet from the bed, continuing to look at them.

“I was informed that the decision was yours,” he says. “I am entirely willing to cooperate with whatever path you choose to follow. Your mother has been removed from the equation. She will never acknowledge you again. However, I come to offer you another solution.”

Shireen waits. She doesn’t know what to say, doesn’t know what he will say. Rickon’s hands have gone slack around hers, but she grips onto him tighter. She needs him.

Stannis takes a deep breath. “If you so wish, I would have you continue to be my daughter, so I can provide for you if need be. You may choose to be my daughter, keep your last name, as well as any protection I can provide.” Stannis finally looks away. His eyes drift around the room and to the window. “I would have never hidden you had your mother not been so persistent. I realize that that was a mistake.”

Swallowing, Shireen stops whatever is building up in her stomach. Never in her life had her father shown her any sort of kindness, and she is entirely baffled as to how this came about. She looks directly at him and mutters, “Thank you.”

Nodding, Stannis takes a small step away. “You will have as much time as you’d like to make your decision, and I will await your response. But if I may have a word.”

He was looking directly at Rickon now, and Rickon’s face furrows up before he turns to face Shireen. Stannis was talking to him for some reason, and he can’t imagine what Stannis would have to say. Giving Shireen’s hands a reassuring squeeze, Rickon shuffles off his bed and follows Stannis into the hallway. They stand facing each other for a full minute before he says something.

Stannis takes a deep breath. “I have been watching over Shireen for her entire life,” he starts. “I have had to maintain my distance, but I have nevertheless cared for her and kept her away from prying eyes. I understand her desires to pull away as she has done so twice now, both times into the arms of boys who would use her and do her harm. I have no qualms about silencing these matters, but I wish to implore upon you the position you are now in as her current… infatuation. Should you harm her in any way or seek means to use her, I will have you silenced. Understood?”

Rickon swallows. He never expected to get a shovel talk from her father. Gendry, maybe, but he didn’t think her dad cared enough to bother. Steeling his nerves, he meets his gaze. “I don’t think you understand that I love her,” Rickon says firmly. “And if for some reason this doesn’t work out, I’d only ever wish for her happiness.”

Intent on staring down Stannis, Rickon is shocked to find that the man smiles. Chuckling slightly, Stannis nods toward Rickon. “I see she’s chosen well this time,” he actually seems to be enjoying this turn of events. His hand slides into his jacket and he pulls out an envelope. “I’ll be retiring from my current position soon… and I do wish to support my daughter regardless of her decision, so I will entrust you to see that she receives this.”

After handing Rickon the envelope, Stannis doesn’t dawdle. He makes his way downstairs quickly. Rickon fiddles with the envelope in his hands until he hears the front door close. Then, he turns back into the room, closing the door behind him. Shireen has put away their game and is now under his bed sheets.

“Was my father threatening you?” she asks.

Rickon nods. He shoves the envelope in his mouth and climbs over his bed to reach her. Shireen reaches up and plucks it from his mouth. “That’s for you,” Rickon says. He wiggles his way under the blankets to join her.

Frowning, Shireen turns the envelope over to find her name written in a strangely neat script. She opens it and pulls out a signed check. “He’s joking,” Shireen mumbles. She shoves the check back in the envelope and tosses it onto his bedside table. “It’s blank. That fucker had the audacity to give me a blank check. What is he pulling?”

Burrowing up to her, Rickon pulls her tight against him. “He actually cares about you, Shir,” he tells her. “And I think he means it given that he was trying to threaten me against hurting you.”

“Well, he has a lot to make up for,” Shireen mutters. “And I know he won’t bother giving up his reputation, so none of it matters.”

“He retiring,” Rickon says, pressing a kiss to her cheek as she jolts up.

“What?” Disbelief is written clear across her face, and she looks at Rickon with a look of extreme concern.

Grabbing onto her waist, Rickon pulls her back down. She goes willingly, slumping down onto the pillows. Rickon squeezes her to his chest, rubbing his nose into her neck. Shireen sighs, turning into him and wrapping her arms around him and kissing his shoulder. He pulls her in as close as he can and looks back at her. “I think he might actually like you,” Rickon says. He pecks a kiss lightly on her lips.

“Too little too late,” Shireen mutters. “I’m not so easily won over.”

“Yeah, I know.” Rickon rolls his eyes. “I’ve been flirting with you all year, and you only just noticed.”

“I thought you weren’t interested!” Shireen shoots back. “I was showering in your room, and you didn’t even try to hit on me!”

Rickon groans. “Um, you mean right after I tried to murder your asshole ex-boyfriend?” he asks. “I’m more sensitive than that.”

“And before that?” Shireen asks.

“You mean when you didn’t stop talking about previously-mentioned asshole? Yeah, that was torture,” Rickon says, laughing. “Meanwhile, you wouldn’t stop rolling around my bed, and I wanted to jump on you.”

Shireen giggles, her face reddening. “Maybe you should do that.”

Rickon gives her a devious smirk, making her move just slightly away from him. He holds onto her waist tightly, making her yelp. “Oh,” he says slowly. “I plan on it.”


	19. Chapter 19

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Picset](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com/post/130140099261/study-buddies-chapter-19)

Epilogue:

“No, Dad, everything’s fine.” Shireen wraps her scarf tighter around her neck, breathing in the crisp, cool air of winter. “I think it’s always cold here,” she laughs. “I really like it, though.”

Shireen has been comfortably living in Winterfell for the last few months. At her insistence, she moved into a dorm for school, only staying with the Starks through the summer and visiting them on weekends. Rickon is finishing up high school, and she is idling outside the school, waiting for it to let out. The bell rings out loudly, and Shireen glances up.

“Yes, Dad, I’ll be safe,” Shireen says, turning to the front of the school. She spots Rickon’s familiar auburn hair in the crowd of students leaving the school. Lifting up a hand, Shireen waves him over. “I gotta go, Dad, but I’ll call you soon.”

Pulling on a beanie over his curls, Rickon bounces up to Shireen. He wraps his arms around her waist and picks her up as she ends the call. Shireen places her forearm across his shoulders to balance her body as she slips her phone into her pocket. Rickon twirls her around before placing her down gently and kissing her full on the mouth. Clutching at his sides, Shireen draws him closer. Rickon’s hands rest on her jaw, tilting her face into his.

“Stop sucking face, Stark!” someone calls loudly.

In response, Rickon pulls Shireen closer, dropping his jaw to deepen their kiss. Shireen laughs against his mouth, sliding her hands up his chest to press him away. “Easy there,” she warns him gently. “We’re in public.”

Smirking at her, Rickon brushes his hand over her scars, pulling her in for a short kiss. “Some friends want to go catch a movie,” he tells her, draping an arm across her shoulders and walking with her for a bit. Wanna come?”

Shireen grins at him. “One condition,” she says firmly. “You stop trying to flirt with me during the movie.”

“What about after?” Rickon asks, waggling his eyebrows at her.

“Oh, I think you can be creative there,” Shireen says, waving a hand through the air.

Rickon grins. Then, he swoops down and tosses her over his shoulder. “Excellent,” he says, walking briskly over to a group of waiting people. “Hey, guys, wanna meet my girlfriend?”

“Rickon, put me down right now!” Shireen calls. She places her hands flat on his back to hold herself up, trying to right her body on her own accord. He ignores her, pressing on to introduce her to his small group of friends turning around so she can shake their hands.

Life with Rickon has been a lot like this, and Shireen has come to love it more than anything. He genuinely cares for her and keeps her laughing, jokes with her and listens to everything she tells him. It was completely unexpected for her, but she finds the thrill of him worth the effort it took to finally have him. Shireen finds that this is especially true on the rare nights when she sneaks into his room, cuddling up with him under the blankets. His arms snake around her automatically, curling up around her to pull her tight against his chest. On these nights she gets to fall asleep to him pressing lazy kisses across her shoulders and running his fingers over her skin.

Rickon can’t say that’s he’s annoyed when he wakes up with Shireen in his arms, but it usually causes a few awkward situations in the morning when his mom goes to check on them. He sometimes feigns sleep until his mom leaves, but she catches him awake on occasion.

“Rickon, why is Shireen here?” Catelyn asks him one morning.

Sighing, Rickon rolls halfway over to face his mom. “Calm down, we’re still clothed,” he tells her. “I think she was just cold.”

In support of his words, Shireen curls up into him, covering him with the blanket and tucking it in around him. Catelyn sighs and gives Rickon a stern look. “Behave yourself,” she tells him. Then, she leaves the room.

As soon as he hears the door close, Shireen stirs in his arms. Rickon rolls his eyes, turning back to look at Shireen, who’s smiling at him and not the least bit sleepy. “Are you just always trying to get me in trouble?” he asks her.

Shireen stretches beside him, and Rickon places a hand on her waist. His fingers dip under the hem of her shirt, and he spreads out his fingers over her ribs. Giggling, Shireen reaches around his hips and grips his ass. “Behave yourself, Rickon,” she teases.

“Oh, because you want me to?” he asks back. He works her shirt off and tosses it to the floor.

Grinning at him, Shireen pulls his shirt off, throwing it behind her and sidling up to him. Tilting down toward her, Rickon rests his forehead against hers, gripping her back and pulling her flush against his chest. Shireen presses her smile against his mouth. “Are you trying to seduce me?”

“You’re the one who came into my bed,” Rickon points out. Shireen’s mouth drops open with a retort, but he silences her with a kiss. At once, they move toward each other. Over the months of dating her, Rickon is glad to know that the spark has yet to dissipate. Everything about her is still so exciting, and he wants to be with her and near every moment he can. “We’re going to get in trouble like this,” he mumbles, not stopping kissing her.

“I’m okay with that,” Shireen says back, grabbing his jaw to kiss him fully. She slips her tongue into his mouth, pushing it against his and dragging him closer to her.

Laughing against her mouth, Rickon eases back slightly before pressing kisses all over her face. Shireen joins him in laughing before she settles down onto his chest and curls up next to him. They lie in silence for a while. Rickon strokes her hair, and Shireen draws patterns against his chest.

“You know what’s going to be fun?” Rickon asks quietly. Shireen gives him a noncommittal hum in response. He presses on. “When we have kids and they bring us presents. Then they’ll ask about presents we got each other, and we’ll have to explain to them what a vibrator is.”

Sitting up, Shireen rolls onto his chest, staring him down. “We are never having kids.”

“Or when we get married and everyone gets to make speeches about it,” he continues.

Shireen narrows her eyes at him. “We’re not getting married.”

Rickon sits up, rolling her onto her back and leaning over her. “Sure, we are,” he says. “And you’re going to love it. Just like I love you.”

Smiling, Shireen leans up and kisses him gently. “I love you, too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The End!!
> 
> Thank you to everyone who stuck through it to the end! Seriously, you guys are awesome. And I do already have another fic planned out (plus a request from [my tumblr](http://frozensnares.tumblr.com) that I'm writing), so keep an eye our for them!


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